


A Charge of Wolves

by christah88



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-12-01
Updated: 2017-06-05
Packaged: 2018-01-03 04:17:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 17
Words: 96,457
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1065658
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/christah88/pseuds/christah88
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sansa, concerned for her cousin’s safety and tired of being under Littlefinger’s thumb, plots their escape from the Vale. Jon doesn’t know what to do with himself or his new army until an unexpected visitor arrives. An envoy finds Rickon and tells him White Harbor marches on Winterfell behind him. Arya hears a secret that impels her to take something that doesn’t belong to her and jump a ship bound for Westeros. Bran watches, unseen, as his siblings’ choices fall, one by one, like an endless, gruesome game of dominoes - but this time, the wolves are resolved to win, and they’ll make up their own rules if they have to.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Alayne I

_Lord Benedar Belmore, Lady Waynwood, the Knight of Ninestars_ , Alayne thought, not for the first time.

They came for Lord Robert’s safety and the right to rule by council. They claimed themselves the Lords Declarant. They rode forth each with a thousand men to clog the stairway and block the food and shake their swords.

Yet, five months later, here they were, sipping wine at weddings together.

 _Lord Benedar Belmore, Lady Waynwood, the Knight of Ninestars_.

Alayne wondered if a more durable victory would have been secured by blood.

On the bed, Lord Robert trembled under silk sheets and fur blankets.

 _I wish you were stronger_ , she thought. _I don’t want you to die._ Lord Robert’s eyes twitched under purple lids at her touch, a pitiful whine originating high in his throat.

She wanted to shake him. She wanted to scream.

His skin was gray, but his messy dark hair was thick and shiny. She took his hand and squeezed her eyes shut.

Bran’s melancholy face gazed back. A fierce little body twisted at the end of a long rope while Lady snapped at Rickon’s toes. Her father’s head looked down with cold eyes while far below his feet did a little dance behind the butcher’s block. She wondered where her sister was, until Arya leapt up from behind the block and barreled at Sansa. “You’re a _liar_!” she shrieked. “And it’s _your_ fault!”

Alayne opened her eyes and blinked back tears. She clenched Sweetrobin’s hand, swallowed down the rising tide of bitterness always brewing in her empty spaces.

Then she raised her other hand and slapped Lord Robert smartly across his cheek.

He moaned and shivered, burrowing deeper into the bed.

Alayne stood, dragged him up to sit against the headboard, and slapped him again. His sharp cheekbone hurt her palm.

“ _Stop_ it!” he screeched, a red glow spreading across his thin face, his large watery eyes glaring at her.

“Lord Robert-” she began sweetly.

“Alayne!” He blinked at her and swayed, peevish but confused. “Did you hit me? How dare you-”

“I have a present for you,” she said quickly.

The change in his countenance was comically swift.

Robert gazed up at her, one hand cupping his cheek, unsure if he should kick and be churlish or smile and be sweet.

“Why are you laughing at me?” he complained.

“A _present_!” she exclaimed, hopping on her toes, hoping to infuse him with good humor. “Don’t you want to know what it is, Sweetrobin? But one should never accept a present when he is grouchy and sullen, didn’t you know that?” She looked down at him, suddenly contemplative. “Perhaps we should wait until you feel better...”

“No!” he decided quickly. “I'm not sullen, but you _hit_ me, Alayne, while I was _sleeping_ and woke me, and- and I’m tired, is all.”

“You’re very difficult to rouse, my sweet. The day is nearly half gone, look, the sun has come out from behind the clouds!” She turned the bed covers down and pulled him to his feet. Lord Robert stood in his nightshirt and stockings, swaying slightly from side to side. Alayne cracked a window to let a cool breeze float in, her nostrils flaring at the welcome bite of winter. Lord Robert shivered.

“It’s so cold,” he moaned.

“Of course it’s cold,” she said briskly. “Winter is almost here. We shall have to be strong, for the maesters say this winter will be long and bitter.”

Lord Robert’s face was long and bitter when he heard that.

“I _hate_ winter,” he pouted, “and I hate it here. There are so many people everywhere. They’re so loud, it makes my head hurt.”

Alayne thought that if the Gates of the Moon were smaller, he would have cried that it was too cramped, and if the people were fewer, he would have demanded more knights and ladies to entertain him.

“Lord Robert,” she said sternly, folding her arms across her chest, “you will not receive your present until you dress yourself and break your fast with me.”

He looked at her as if she had gone mad. “Dress _myself_?” he demanded. “Duana always dresses me.”

“Oh! I didn’t realize you were wearing gowns now, with lace and ribbons down your back.”

Lord Robert tilted his head and squinted at her, bewildered. He looked as though he couldn’t make any sense out of her words. Alayne hoped he didn’t damage himself with the strain.

“ _Gowns_?” he sputtered, aghast. “Ribbons down my back?!”

She caught his eye and smiled widely.

Something shifted in him; he stood a little straighter, his shoulders relaxing minutely. She placed her hands on his arms, and he smiled back tentatively.

The change was startling, his wide eyes wary but not sulky for once, and Alayne thought he might be handsome if he were healthy. He looked so vulnerable, like he wanted to giggle and jump and clap his hands about presents with her but wasn’t quite sure how, that Alayne felt compelled to pull him close and wrap her arms around him.

They stood together for a few moments, her arms cradling his head against her stomach, his hands clutching the scratchy wool of her dress at her hips. Alayne knelt in front of him, clasping his wrists so she could look into his face.

“Lord Robert, I know you are lonely, and I know you are sad about your mother.” He made to turn from her, but Alayne shifted her hands to his small waist and drew him closer. “I am sad about your mother, too. I’m sad about _my_ mother, my lord, and my brothers and sister.” Robert looked as though he would question her, so she pressed on quickly. “I’m sad that we had to leave the Eyrie, and I’m sad about this war that has taken so many men and women early to their graves and kept me from going home. Sometimes I am so sad that I think I will die from it, from the giant space inside me where my family and my home used to be.” She felt tears in her eyes, and saw them in her Sweetrobin’s eyes as well. “Do you know what is the only thing that makes me happy now? The one good thing that has come from this endless, miserable war?”

Sweetrobin shook his head disconsolately, and Alayne touched the wetness on his cheek. “It is that I have found you, my Sweetrobin. You are my cousin. You are the last alive who shares my blood. I have lost everything, my family, my home, my silly songs, dreams for the future, but I have found _you_. And that makes me happy, Lord Robert. It fills me up inside where I am empty. Do you know what I mean, Robert, when I say ‘where I am empty’?”

He sniffled, scrunched his nose and nodded.

Alayne pondered how best to proceed with her spoiled, broken little cousin.

“Lord Robert, do you love Lord Baelish?”

Robert looked confused, and asked, “Your father, you mean?”

She’d decided almost before he finished the question.

“Petyr Baelish is not my father," she confessed. "He has put forth the lie in order to protect me. He has gone to great lengths to ensure my safety as a refuge.” She knew she ought to be more guarded with her young cousin, but he was the last family member she had left, and she wouldn’t leave him to be poisoned by a pretender. “But I am no longer sure- I am no longer convinced...” she licked her lips, struggling to choose her words, but Robert piped up before she could continue.

“I do not love Lord Littlefinger,” he declared. “I only ever loved my mother. She was gentle and kind, and loved me and always gave me what I wanted. But she is gone now. The bad man made her fly, and she’ll never come back to me or hold me again, or tell me that I will be a great lord someday!”

Robert clenched his hands in tight little fists and swayed. Alayne was half afraid he would faint.

“Alayne,” he said softly, clutching at her hand, “do you think I will be a great lord someday?”

“You will be the Warden of the East, Lord Protector of the Vale-”

“I know that!” he cried, distressed. “I know that I will be Lord as my father was. But my mother told me I would be a _great_ lord!”

“Lord Robert,” Alayne said, “did your mother teach you _how_ to become a great lord?”

Robert Arryn blinked at her. “She told me I would be one! She said I must be because I was such a sweet boy, and strong!”

Alayne pursed her lips. “My _real_ father was a great lord. My mother was a true lady. She taught me how to be a lady, what I must do and say, and how to behave. It wasn’t always easy, and I have since come to think that some of what she taught me wasn’t always right. But I am a better lady than I would have been without her.”

Her cousin weighed her words against a lifetime of assurances that he would never have to struggle or work at being anything than what he was- a delight.

“My father taught my brothers about being a lord,” she told him. “He took them to councils with his bannermen, and to court when the townspeople came with their grievances. My brothers would tell me about it afterward, a little. Mostly they said it was _dreadfully_ boring, and that a lord was subject to all his subjects’ most tedious little subjects!” She pulled a face, and Lord Robert giggled. “A lord is important because he has responsibilities: not just to his soldiers, but to his peasants and laborers, his family and his servants, his lands and his subjects’ lands. There never was a great lord who did not first learn what it _means_ to be a lord, and then how to become one.”

Her cousin gazed at her, mouth slightly agape.

“Do you think I could be a great lord, Alayne?” he asked again, almost fearfully.

“Do you _want_ to be a great lord?” she asked.

“Yes,” he breathed without hesitation. “Yes, it’s all I’ve ever wanted, for myself, and for... for my mother.”

Alayne tried to be stern.

“It won't be easy,” she warned him, “but I can teach you what I learned from my brothers and my father, and my mother too, and other people along the way, though they were not so kind. Do you want to learn from me?”

Robert’s mouth opened and closed again. Alayne thought the Lord Protector of the Vale looked a bit like a lost guppy.

“I don’t like lessons,” he warned her. “But if _you_ think I must, then yes, I want to learn from you.” He said it so doubtfully that it brought her little brother Rickon to mind, and Sansa had never before considered the two much alike.

“It takes more than memorization to become a great lord, Robert,” Alayne said. “If you work hard and begin to consider yourself a great lord with responsibilities to your people and lands, not in the future, but _now_... then, I believe you will become a great lord someday in truth, Lord Robert.”

His eyes lit up, his smile as wide and radiant as a sunrise. “I love you, cousin Alayne,” he said.

Sansa stilled her hands and said, “I love you too, cousin Robert.”

They smiled at each other a moment longer, their new understanding tenuous but bright between them. Then she turned toward the dresser and opened the doors decisively.

“A great lord must dress himself, dear cousin, this shall be your first lesson.”

It was not until _after_ he had chosen his garments for the day and dressed himself while Alayne watched (though in the end she relented and helped him tie up the sides), after they had broken their fast together on sweet pears and toast, Lord Robert’s legs dangling from the great lord’s chair, after she had dragged him up three flights of stairs to Maester Coleman’s solar, meeting Myranda Royce halfway up and pulling her along with them, after they had taken turns writing important letters to imaginary lords and ladies, beseeching their presence at this tourney or that wedding, demanding barley in exchange for sheep, after they were mid-way through their recitation of all thirty-two great Houses in the East, their sigils, founders, leaders and crops, when Lord Robert finally remembered he had been promised a present.

“House Lynderly of the Snakewood,” he recited miserably. “Lord Jon’s... great-grandfather?” he questioned, looking at Maester Coleman. The maester nodded. Robert continued, temple propped on one hand, the other moving restlessly back and forth, the point of his quill scratching dryly on a piece of marked-up parchment. “Lynderly came upon the Snakewood while riding down from the Fingers with his brothers at the end of a very long winter. They were looking for lands suited for sheep and cows. Lynderly thought this would be his new home. But then his brother dug his hand in the soil, and when stood back up, he had a handful of dirt and wriggling black _snakes_ all wrapped around his arm!”

Lord Robert’s little legs were swinging vigorously now. He bounced lightly in his seat, a gleam in his eye and a fervid little smile lighting up his face. _Boys_ , Alayne thought, and sighed.

“Lynderly thought his brother would die for sure, but then he looked around and saw that the _grass_ was slithering and crawling up their legs! The grass came up past their ankles, and in it were hundreds of snakes, _slithering_ closer and closer... they smelled human blood, you know... He pulled one tiny black snake from inside his boot, and he yelled and tried to _kick_ the other little snakes from his legs, and then he _squeezed_ the snake in his hand so hard it oozed black blood all down his fingers, so he bit its head off and spat slimy black blood all over everything! And the little snakes didn’t like that, so they crawled back down his legs and off his brother’s arm and slithered away. And now the Lynderlys paint black snake blood on their faces and arms when they go out to plant, and the tiny black snakes stay far away from them.”

Lord Robert looked up proudly at the end of his story. Maester Coleman looked down at the thick tome on his spindly table, searching vainly for the thrilling tale of the Lynderlys and the black snakes.  _The Vale of Arryn: Histories of the Noble Houses of the East_  laid open on a more demure recounting of House Lynderly.

“That was quite exciting, my lord,” Alayne said, “Though I think the ending got away from you a bit. The snakes just crawled away, did they?”

Lord Robert shrugged. “I don’t know why, but that is how the Lynderlys came to the Snakewood. And now they have tiny green snakes on a field of black as their sigil.”

Lady Myranda snorted. The stout young woman had been content to smirk at Lord Robert’s occasional petulance, chiefly looking out a window across the room from the maester’s pupils, but now she turned and challenged her little liege.

“So why _green_ snakes on a _black_ field, Lord Robert? Shouldn’t they have rather taken black snakes on a field of green, like the grass where Lynderly nearly encountered his doom, as you recounted so elegantly?”

The boy looked stumped for a moment. Alayne feared he would begin to grouse when the maester intervened.

“The Lynderlys take their sigil from snakes in the wood around their fortress, it is true,” he agreed, and Alayne’s cousin looked ready to triumph. “But the black oils they smear on their cheeks and arms protects them from stinging beetles and red swamp mosquitoes, not snakes. The Lynderlys’ farmlands stretch all the way to the sea and around several bogs.”

“So why paint snakes on their sigils, if not to crow their defeat of the little wriggling monsters?” Robert argued. Alayne tried not to smile.

“They don’t harm the green snakes of the Snakewood, Lord Robert,” she told him. “They eat field rodents and pesky swamp mosquitoes! The Lynderlys take them on their sigil in honor of the gift the snakes give them: fertile soil and uneaten crops.”

Lord Robert crossed his arms sullenly. “My story was better. Why would anyone think a _snake_ was a gift?”

He gasped and sat up straight as a pin, looking at Alayne with wide, startled eyes.

“What is it, Sweetrobin?” she asked, concerned.

“You said you had a present for me!” he exclaimed. “You woke me up and said you had a present for me, but you forgot to give it to me, and I suppose I forgot too.” He looked disturbed.

Maester Coleman watched Lord Robert thoughtfully. Myranda Royce gazed appraisingly at Alayne. She stood up from the bench she shared with her cousin.

“Stay here, my lord,” she said over her shoulder, “and recite what you know of House Melcolm for Maester Coleman.” She turned at the door and pinned him with a stern look. “And no snakes!”

She held out a hand to Myranda Royce. “My lady, will you assist me with Lord Robert’s present?” she asked. “It’s quite a handful, and I wouldn’t want my lord to wait a moment more than necessary.” They exited the solar together, arm in arm, Lord Robert positively bouncing with excitement.

When Myranda saw Lord Robert’s gift in the stable next to the kitchens, she melted and cooed, then shook her head at Alayne, laughing.

“He won’t be able to handle it, you know,” she said. “It’ll be you cleaning up and looking after it.”

“He will look after it, my lady,” Alayne reassured her. “He is eight years old, sickly and prone to fits, and he’s lost his father, his mother and his home. But he will handle it just fine.”

Myranda regarded her. “As you handle him. I’m impressed with you, Alayne Stone. He looks to you for strength, not just guidance, and today I saw something in him that I haven’t seen before. A bit of spirit. _Snakes_!” She snickered and placed her hands on her hips. “To the Seven, I don’t know why you bother. He’ll never be hale and won’t likely last the winter-”

“He _will_ ,” Alayne protested before she could stop herself. “He will be Lord of the Eyrie, my lady, a great lord in the East.”

“He would be _Warden_ of the East, you mean,” Myranda said. “He would be Lord Protector of the Vale, and ruler over those thirty-two Houses he’s reciting even now.”

 _Lord Benedar Belmore, Lady Waynwood, the Knight of Ninestars_. Alayne paused and tried not to let doubt seep in. She could teach Lord Robert to be Lord of the Eyrie, to rule his crops and tend to his people, even to command a guard. But the Eyrie contained thirty-two Houses of great men and women who ruled their own households and commanded their own guards, who raised crops and tended flocks and fed and clothed their people without a Warden holding their hands. Myranda was right: Robert would never be hale or hearty, he would never be a feared warrior to demand respect and strict obedience, to command an army. Alayne was sick to death of war and armies, but she wondered how kindly the Houses of the Vale and the outlying lands would take to being ruled by Robert. She could not help but doubt that they needed Robert to rule them, and could not help but wonder why they needed to be ruled.

“My father once told me that the greatest decisions are made in collaboration,” she told Myranda. “He said that lords who choose together, fight together, and men and women who plan together, build together.”

“Your _father_ said that?” Myranda asked incredulously. “Lord Protector of the Vale, who waved away a Council of Lords Declarant with a flick of his little finger?”

Alayne froze. _Stupid girl, hold your tongue!_ “Yes, my lady, my father told me that a long time ago. I’m not sure if he changed his mind or was simply philosophizing, but- he said those words to me, once.”

Myranda did not look like she believed her, but let it pass. “Well, perhaps he’s not so jealous of his rule as I once thought. He is bringing these ‘Lords Declarant’ together again, after all, and a handful more besides.”

Alayne was surprised. “What do you mean?”

“I received word from my father just yesterday,” the older girl shrugged. They turned toward the inner door and started up the stairs. “Lords Littlefinger, Corbray and his brother, Grafton, Templeton, Belmore and Royces- my father and my uncle- and Lady Waynwood and her nephew will meet here three moons from now. We’re to have a great feast, and my father seems to think the Lord Protector will pull _something_ out his sleeve to convince the Lords to keep him as Warden, or at least give him another year. What do you think, Alayne?”

Alayne followed Lady Royce on the steps, staring blankly at Myranda’s bottom, trying to swallow her heart down her throat. _Lord Benedar Belmore, Lady Waynwood, the Knight of Ninestars. And Lady Waynwood’s nephew, Harold Hardying, Harry the Heir come for me at last._ She felt slightly ill.

“Yes,” she cleared her throat at the slight catch in her voice, “yes, I think it’s safe to say he has some trick up his sleeve.”

Her cousin flew at her as she reentered the solar. “Where have you been?” Robert demanded, little hands grabbing at her as he looked around her back, under her skirts, searching for his gift. “You’ve been forever, where is my present?” And then, a squeal, “Oh!”

Myranda had followed her inside, the four-month-old puppy cradled on her bosom. He was a shepherd mix, with soft brown fur and sleepy eyes, a dark muzzle, and a long black streak running down his back. His tail curved a bit awkwardly, and his paws were so big Alayne wondered how fast he might outgrow her cousin. He was adorable.

Robert thought so too, for he held his arms out wordlessly, and Myranda placed the pup in his gentle grip. He held the puppy close, cuddling him to his cheek for a moment, before pulling back and squinting at him.

“What shall I call him?” he demanded.

“He is yours, Lord Robert, to raise and take care of, to play with and to teach and to name. What do you want to call him?

Robert considered the puppy for a moment. The dog sniffed at him, their noses bumping briefly.

“Can I...” Lord Robert began, then hesitated. “Can I call him Robert?” he asked.

Alayne giggled. “Of course you can call him Robert, my sweet, but then how will we tell the two of you apart?”

Robert smiled, for once catching on to her teasing. He set the pup down and squatted next to him, watching as the other Robert sniffed at his boots, then a basket full of quills and ink, then turned his head and bit a table leg. “No, no, good lord Robert,” her cousin said, “don’t chew on that.” He dragged the pup away and back into his arms, and yelped when the dog promptly started chewing on his hand instead.

“You’re to care for him, to take him with you everywhere, or to arrange care for him when you cannot have him with you, do you understand?” Alayne asked him. Robert nodded, distracted. “But let us think of another name for him, cousin, for you will be good lord Robert yourself.”

“No!” Robert cried. “You said you would teach me, and I would be a _great_ lord, don’t you remember?”

Alayne blinked and nodded.

“So you will teach me to be great lord Robert, and I will teach him to be Good Lord Robert.” Before Alayne could press the subject further, the pup pawed his way into a corner, turned three quick circles, and squatted. Maester Coleman groaned.

“Good Lord Robert!” great lord Robert squealed. “What are you- no, no, you must go outside!”

Myranda guffawed, and Alayne grabbed a scrap piece of parchment off the desk.

“Here you are, great lord Robert,” she said with a smile, and her cousin gazed at her, mortified. He looked as though he would argue, but the pup walked back and sat at his feet, peering up at him. Robert sighed and took the parchment from her hand.

“Take him outside when you’re done, my lord,” she instructed, turning for the door. “Thank you, Maester Coleman. We will begin again tomorrow, after an early breakfast.” She caught her cousin’s eye where he kneeled in the corner, and he nodded.

Myranda bid her farewell, heading to the kitchens to organize their supper, and Alayne walked back to her room, thinking. Her cousin would grow stronger, and he would learn and become respectful, diligent. She was determined of it. She remembered his story of the Snakewood and grinned to herself. _He is spirited, after all_.

She thought on what Myranda had told her and shivered. She wondered how much longer she would have to instruct her cousin before she was torn away from him, separated once more from what she loved. _I must find a way to keep him_ , she thought. _I must find a way to get what I want_. “Once you know what a man wants,” her father had told her, “You know what he is, and how to control him.” She wondered what the Lords Declarant wanted. She wasn’t sure she knew anymore.

 _Lord Benedar Belmore, Lady Waynwood, the Knight of Ninestars_ , Alayne thought, not for the first time.


	2. Jon I

The fires burned night and day around his head, but all Jon Snow felt was cold.

On an icy ledge not very far away, a lonely white wolf lifted his nose to the wind and howled.

“My lord?” Jon heard the boy whisper hesitantly behind crackling flames. He turned to the wall and closed his eyes.

They ran through the snow, a salty scent hot on their nose. Their claws dug in the frozen dirt beneath white flakes, their tendons springing with each leap and bound. Their paws were cold as ice, but the sweet flow of breath and blood through their limbs was pure joy.

The wolf turned his head and looked at him with bright red eyes. “ _Jon_ ,” he said. Jon wrenched away, tumbling alone down a deep empty hole to his bed where the fires burned all around.

“Jon,” he heard again and blinked dancing black spots from his eyes.

“What do you want?” he croaked. She stepped between glowing brass piers, the red glare flushed high in her cheeks, glinting in her copper strands.

“It's time, Jon,” she said, her voice low and urgent. “You must speak to them and discover what’s happening beyond the Wall.”

“No,” he said and turned his back to her. His eyes traced familiar cracks in the granite, his mind empty as a broken cask. He heard an impatient sigh and the quick click of her heels departing, but he didn’t think much about it. He didn’t think much at all anymore.

Hot blood seeped between their teeth and down their throat. The elk tried to fight, but he was old and awkward. He snagged his gnarled antlers in a tangle of dead brush and screamed when they leapt upon him, sinking their teeth in his gullet. He stamped and screamed, but they finished him quickly, gulping down steaming strands of slippery warm meat to settle in their belly. A handful of their smaller cousins crept through the glen around them, but they lifted their snout in a silent snarl, and the other wolves paced, waiting. When their belly was sagging with the warm weight of their kill, they trotted away through the trees and left the rest for their gray brothers.

“Gods be damned and pull me member off.” Jon felt the hair of the man’s coarse beard scratching his chin. “She’s a witch, or he’s a wight. Or I’m a shovelhead without me tool, har!”

 _You’re a mouthbreather_ , Jon thought, wrinkling his nose against the warm smell of garlic wafting over his face. He felt Tormund leaning closer, but he kept his eyes closed and sunk deeper into the bed, escaping down into the deep dark hole inside himself.

The snow was deeper here, flakier, mounds of wet white crystals scattering down the slope as they pushed their paws in and climbed higher into the clear black sky. The cold damp air was refreshing on their tongue, the night’s stillness a blessed relief. Their mind was clean and purposeful. When they reached the top, they sat back on their haunches and gulped down the quiet night, nostrils quivering. Simple, earthy scents threaded the air.

They padded between two thick husks into a ring of trees. Across the circle stood a wide, gnarled weirwood, its branches thick white fingers grasping at the empty night. They trotted through the ring and sniffed suspiciously at its smooth bark. It smelled old and clean. A crude face had been carved on its trunk, its eyes familiar.

The wolf howled at the stars glittering disdainfully a thousand leagues above them.

“Forgive me,” he choked.

Suddenly, the temperature dropped. The wolf whined. A wind rattled their strong bones and burned the tip of their quivering nose.

“I did all I could,” he said angrily. “I tried to save them, and they killed me for it.” The night was static. The face looked back, immobile.

“What do you want of me?” he growled. “I shouldn’t be here. I shouldn’t be anywhere anymore.”

Blood leaked from its gaping mouth and slid down smooth white bark in sticky globs. The wolf padded forward curiously and lapped up the red sap as though it were a clean mountain spring. He sat back when finished, satisfied and full, tongue flicking up the gooey drops stuck in his fur.

“ _Jon_!” a voice cried, and the wolf’s ears pricked up. He tilted his head inquisitively, though Jon urged him to run, to fly back down the slope into an empty, thoughtless night.

“ _I was so afraid, Jon_!” the voice cried again, and Ghost sniffed at the face, putting his whole nose in its open mouth. “ _I felt the knives, and then you were gone, just... empty_.”

Jon didn’t want to think about that. “Bran,” he said, “don’t you know you’re dead? Like me.”

“ _You must go back, Jon_ ,” his brother urged him, “ _you haven’t finished yet_.”

“I have!” Jon said bitterly. “It wasn’t my choice, but I’m done.”

“ _If you were finished_ ,” Bran said, “ _you’d be dead_.”

“I'm not?” Jon asked. “Isn’t ‘not alive’ the same as dead?”

“ _No, it isn’t_ ,” Bran sighed.

A great weariness settled in his bones. “Damn,” he said.

“ _Jon_ ,” Bran replied, “ _it’s time_.”

He felt old, tired, cold and gray. He was done, his story was over, why couldn’t they understand? “I don’t have anything else to give,” he said. “There’s nothing left of me.”

“ _I know_ ,” Bran said, “ _but you must get out of bed anyway_.”

“Lord Commander!” His eyes flicked open at the urgent whisper. Satin crouched low over the bed, shaking Jon’s arm even as he looked over his shoulder toward the door. When he turned, he jumped to see Jon’s eyes looking back in the flickering light.

“What is it?” Jon asked groggily, pulling himself up through heavy leagues of water to sit at the bed’s edge.

“He’s, he’s come to see you, my lord,” the boy stammered, dark eyes wide in his thin face. “I’ve told him and _told_ him to go away, but he won’t listen this time...”

“Who?” Jon asked.

“Bowen Marsh,” Satin answered.

He was standing in the doorway. Red flames licked shadows on his face. Satin backed into the corner.

“Hello,” Bowen Marsh said.

He wore a ragged fur cloak and his gloves were muddy. When he noticed Jon staring, he pulled them off and hid them away underneath his cloak. His hands were shaking.

“Why are you here?” Jon asked. “Have you come to kill me?”

“My men are waiting for me outside the door,” Bowen Marsh said hastily. “I would choose to keep this civil, so don’t get any ideas.”

“No,” Jon said. “I’ll leave those to you.”

Bowen Marsh opened his mouth, but stood frozen a moment, without words. _He’s ugly_ , Jon thought, _an ugly, twisted little man_.

“Did you lose your tongue as well as your shame?” Jon asked.

“You’re no brother of mine,” Bowen Marsh responded.

Jon felt a distant sting in his heart, so small he couldn’t be sure it was real. “So you need not call yourself ‘kinslayer’,” he said.

“You’re not dead!” Bowen Marsh exclaimed.

“You tried your best,” Jon hissed, rising from the bed. Rage bubbled quick and hot. Marsh backed away. “What do you want?” he asked again.

“You must understand,” Marsh said anxiously. "It was not my idea! I wanted no part in it.”

“Are you sure?” Jon asked. “Your knife felt as sharp as the others, when you cut me.”

“Th-the men...” Bowen stammered. “They weren't happy with what you were doing. I warned you. I did. This mess with Roose Bolton’s bastard, and Stannis... We are sworn, Jon, not to take part in matters of the realm!”

“I know the words,” Jon snapped. “I assumed not killing your Lord Commander was an unspoken part of the vow.”

“And this business with the wildlings,” he continued, “You have only been a man of the Watch for three years. The rest of us spent our _lives_ crossing blades with them! There’s not a man among us who hasn’t lost a brother to one of them. There’s hardly a man among us who hasn’t killed one himself!”

“Is there a man among you who wants to see the next spring?” Jon growled. “I knew my brothers were a flock of fools, but I hadn’t realized the man at my side was a snake.”

“How could it have ever worked?” Bowen Marsh snarled. “We’ve thrown them back for _thousands_ of years, but now you want to let them through? And give them _our_ swords and _our_ axes, and tell us to raise neither hand nor blade against them? Gods, they were knocking at our gate with a battering ram not a year ago, did you forget that?”

“I have not forgotten,” Jon said. “ _I_ was there.”

Lines wrinkled the man’s purple face. “Yes,” Marsh mused, “you had just returned from your _assignment_.”

Jon bit his tongue with enough force to tear it in two. “I want you gone,” he said, his voice strangled.

Puffy yellow shadows sagged under his dark eyes. “No,” Bowen Marsh said, “I want _you_ gone.” He worked his jaw back and forth. “They've voted me Lord Commander. It’s the wish of the Night’s Watch that you leave Castle Black immediately. We’re expelling the wildlings as well.”

It was so unfair Jon choked.

“They found a leader in you after all,” he said, “when you stabbed me in the back.”

“The men of the Night’s Watch choose their Lord Commander with stones,” Bowen Marsh said scornfully, “and un-choose him with knives.”

Jon’s fist smashed the old man’s saggy jowl, the soft skin crumpling against his knuckles. Bowen Marsh staggered back, his hand rising to his cheek. Jon took a step forward, clasped the front of his cloak in one fist, and punched him again, this time square in the nose.

Marsh’s hands flapped at him uselessly. He squawked when Jon slammed him against the door, his head bouncing against the wood.

“For the Watch!” Jon snarled through gritted teeth, and hit him again. A bloody stream gushed from one nostril and dripped down his neck. He mumbled incoherently, one eye already swelling over. Jon held him against the door when the men outside swung it open, and they fell hard to the ground together.

For Jon there was only the heavy pounding in his ears and Bowen Marsh's teeth splintering against his fist.

He was yanked to his feet and shoved back into the room, the heat sticky and suffocating. The crack of a backhand took him by surprise. He stumbled into one of the burning piers, his elbow narrowly missing the licking flames. Othell Yarwyck glared at him from the doorway, kneeling beside the bloody heap he had left of Bowen Marsh. Jon spat on the floor, and a hand flashed up, another loud crack splitting the air as well as his lip.

“ _Stop_!” he heard Satin protest. “He’s down! He’s done!” Left Hand Lew turned to glower at him.

“ _You’re_ here,” he growled. “The once Lord Commander batters old men, yet keeps his little boys close.”

“It’s fine, Satin,” Jon said, running his tongue over bloody teeth. “I can’t feel it anyhow.”

“You shouldn’t be here,” Othell Yarwyck spat while Marsh moaned. “You’re one of _them_.”

“What, a wildling?” Jon opened his mouth in a bloody smile. “Don’t worry. I’m leaving and taking my wildling army with me. Castle Black is for the crows.”

“Not a wildling,” Yarwyck shook his head and rose, staggering under Marsh’s weight. “A dead thing."

Left Hand Lew looked at Jon as though he had grown three slimy heads.

“Take your red witch with you when you leave,” Lew snarled, “ _bastard_.” The crackling flames masked their scuffling footsteps as they hauled Bowen Marsh away.

He heard her heels clattering up the hall before she appeared in the doorway.

“What did you do?” Melisandre demanded. “Why is Bowen Marsh a sack of bloody bones?”

Jon didn’t answer. _You did this to me_ , he thought. “Where is Tormund Giantsbane?”

“He was at Hardin’s Tower with the wildling princess,” she answered. “They entered together after supper.”

“Come,” Jon said, “we’re leaving.”

He strode out the door and down the steps, ignoring her questions and Satin’s nervous presence. They were in the King’s Tower, he saw. Torches were lit in every sconce, bright yellow flames flickering every few feet along the dusty stone hallway. He had not recognized the room when he woke, but now Jon realized he had been sleeping in Lady Melisandre’s chambers. _Perfect_ , he thought.

“How long has it been?” he asked.

She kept pace with his quick steps. “Since you died, or since you woke?”

“Since they stabbed me at Hardin’s Tower,” Jon snapped.

“Ten days,” Melisandre shrugged.

“ _Ten days_?” Jon asked incredulously. “How many died in the fighting? How is Castle Black not a rubble?”

“Perhaps fifty,” she told him. “Most of them wildlings, though some of your brothers were lost as well. It lasted nearly a day. Bowen Marsh led the crows up the Wall, where they could try to hold them off.”

“They could not have withstood the wildlings more than a few days,” Jon said, “unless they were to burn the stair again, and then they would have frozen or starved, or both.”

“They did not burn the stair,” Melisandre said. “The wildlings retreated before the sun set the next day. Tormund negotiated a peace of sorts with Bowen Marsh.”

“Why?” Jon asked, bewildered.

“Because I brought you back,” she said, a touch of pride curling her dark red lips, “and they saw that you had been dead, but then were not.”

He pushed open the hard oak door with a squeal of rusty hinges. The blast of air was frigid and cruel. Two Queen’s men stood guard at the door and gaped when they saw him. Jon paid them no mind and strode into the courtyard toward Hardin’s Tower. “Must you speak in riddles?” he demanded irritably.

“Riddles are candles, Jon Snow, shedding flickers of light on the truth to those who would understand,” Melisandre answered, her red skirts fluttering about her ankles. “But I speak no riddles to you now. Four of your men stabbed you beneath the tower, and you died. When the women came down to see what the yelling was about, it started. The giant mauled three more besides Ser Patrek before your crows took him down. The wildlings went mad. Fifty men dead in twenty minutes. The crows took to the Wall, and the wildlings formed an attack from below. I built the fires around your head where you lay bleeding in the snow. I prayed to R’hlorr to look down upon you and save you from your mortal wounds, to bring you back if it be his will, if he had some other purpose for you in his war against the darkness. And then you breathed again.”

They had reached the spot where Wun Weg Wun Dar Wun had smashed Ser Patrek of the Mountain’s head into bloody splinters, and daggers flashed in the dark like falling stars. Jon stared down at the ground beneath Hardin’s Tower, running his hand uneasily over the knitted holes in his torso.

“You lay there all night and all day,” Melisandre said, her voice clear in the crisp cold night, and Jon looked up and saw them spilling over the courtyard and training ground, from the Lance Tower, the Silent Tower, the Rookery and the Armory, free folk and fire worshippers, old men and boys younger than Satin, hard women, spearwives, all clad in thick furs and boiled leather, some in hauberks jingling with each step crunching through the snow, all armed with axes, shortswords, two-handed greatswords, daggers at their belts and knives strapped across their chests. “You lay beneath my fires, and you were cold to the touch, Jon Snow,” Melisandre continued, “you were dead almost a full day, but I prayed to the Lord of Light to return you to your mortal coil, for we have need of you. The Hero Reborn!” She turned to the crowd gathering close, thousands of hungry eyes come to see the dead man walking. “Your life was spent by those you called your brothers, but the Lord of Light is good, and he is powerful, and now you breathe again!”

“You might have warned me you were massing an army on my doorstep, boy,” a gruff voice said in his ear. Jon turned to see Tormund Giantsbane, tall and broad as a rugged rock crag, his bushy gray beard dirty and tangled, his thick brown furs adding inches to his already imposing breadth. Val stood next to him, pale and proud, her thick blonde braid wrapped over her right shoulder.

“Tormund,” Jon greeted him with a nod, his voice flat. “You didn’t lead the ranging to Hardhome, I see.”

“None’s gone past the Wall since you died, crow,” Tormund said. “So are you one o’ them or one of us?”

Jon snorted. “I’m no one of consequence, of course. What do they want? Why are they all here?”

“They’ve come to see you. They’re ready for a change, or a fight. This peace has been fragile, boy, and you’ve been lounging in bed.”

Jon remembered Left Hand Lew’s face when he had looked at Jon, and the feel of Bowen Marsh’s wet mouth against his fist. “This isn’t peace; it’s waiting.”

“Well, that’s fragile too,” Tormund complained.

“What is your plan, Lord Snow?” Val asked impatiently, her hand moving restlessly over the weirwood hilt of her blade. “Do we march on Winterfell as before? Your sister may still be there.”

Jon blinked at her words. Winterfell was far away, a hazy memory he couldn’t quite grasp. He wondered if Arya had really married Ramsay Bolton. He tried briefly to picture his little sister, but all he saw were worms wriggling on bones buried in cold dirt.

“No,” Jon said. “The Wall is mine. We’re moving to the Nightfort.”

Tormund grunted and Melisandre turned to regard him, another cold wind gusting through their thick cloaks and swirling her skirts in a little tornado.

“Queen Selyse expects to make the Nightfort her seat,” Val pointed out, wrinkling her nose to show what she thought of the queen’s demands.

“She may come,” Jon said to Melisandre. “I wouldn’t leave her here if she would not stay. Castle Black is full of cowards and backstabbers. But the Wall is mine.”

Melisandre’s eyes glowed brighter than the ruby pulsing at her throat. They turned as one to the crowd grumbling impatiently in the yard before them. _My army of free folk and followers of fire_. Jon would have laughed if he remembered how.

“My brothers have grown weary of me,” Jon called out. A few mirthless laughs, some shouts answered him. “The man who killed me has been voted Lord Commander in my place. I thought the Night’s Watch was the realm’s last hope against the Others, but I see no hope in them now. The enemy is out there, and they would shut their eyes and wish it weren’t so. The Wall is mine, and they would take it from me. They’ve demanded my departure, and yours along with me.” A bitter flood of curses broke and rolled over the night. Jon waited until it began to die out before he continued. “I’m moving to the Nightfort,” he told them. “I’m leaving tonight.” Jon paused and turned to the Wall, a wide gray shadow glimmering behind the evening mist. He craned his neck to look up at where it met the darkening sky.

Melisandre stepped forward, spreading her arms wide. “The night’s king fought the dead for thirteen years from the Nightfort,” she cried, her tones ringing through the cold stone courtyard. “Join the night’s king, and when the dead come, we will throw them back with fire!”

Jon sighed and pushed away toward the Wall. _She talks too much_ , he thought.

“Where are you going?” Tormund demanded.

“Lead them,” Jon said, tired of the crowd. “Just keep the Wall to your left; you can't fail to find it.”

“How are we to find our feet in this darkness?” he groused.

“Lady Melisandre will guide you by the light of her fires,” Jon answered and turned his back. When he reached the cage, he glanced up and saw hard-faced black shadows looking down on him from the stair.

 _I hate them_ , Jon thought.

“My lord,” Jon turned to find Satin at his heels.

“What is it?” Jon asked wearily.

“I would come with you to the Nightfort, my lord,” the boy said.

Jon looked at him and felt nothing. “Why?” he asked.

“To be your steward,” Satin answered. “To serve as your squire.”

“You are bound to the Watch. I wouldn’t have it said I led any man to break his vows.”

“What vow do I break by following my Lord Commander?” Satin asked him, his voice smooth and lovely.

Jon turned and opened the doors to the cage, too tired to fight. “Very well,” he said without much feeling. “Start the winch and leave me now.”

He pulled the doors closed and leaned against the cage, bruises stinging with each rattle and jerk. The ride was slow, cold and uncomfortable, but for Jon it was just another waking dream. When he stepped out onto the Wall, the snap of bitter winds made his limbs tremble, though he felt it only distantly. He was very tall, removed from the world, his head empty and still.

 _The Wall is mine_. He stood at the precipice and watched the fires flickering below. He tried to look beyond them toward the South, but his eyes couldn’t penetrate the void. He didn’t care. There was nothing that way for him to see.

He walked. His steps were careful, but he slipped on glassy patches every now and then. The fires burned and his humming army followed below. Jon's teeth chattered and his legs shook, his very bones made of ice. A cruel wind stripped frozen flakes of skin from his face, but he hardly noticed. All Jon Snow ever felt was cold.


	3. Rickon I

“The spear is part of you,” Maggon Magos said. “Lift it with your stomach, and throw it with your lungs, your groin, and your legs.”

“I know,” Rickon responded, “you said that already.” He gripped the spear in his right hand and tried to think of it as another limb, as flesh, blood and breath, like him.

“The inner eye’s aim is truer than the outer eye’s.”

Maggon Magos was always saying things like that. The day before, he told Rickon that “ _Man cannot fight rocks and trees, but when he does, he loses_.” And the day before that, “ _Blind boys seethe with anger, and angry boys go blind_.” That had been after the hunt, when the smell of blood and the crunch of ice and the wild snapping winds swept him and Shaggydog into a frenzy. Shaggy tackled a brown elk and ripped a long dark hole in its belly, gulping down steaming entrails while Rickon stabbed his spear through its heart in savage triumph, again and again. He didn’t remember much about the hunt, actually, just the icy winds blowing back his hair and hot dark blood spattering his cheek. Maggon Magos had taken his spear and snarled that the hunt should be respected and that boys who could not control their rage could not control their weapon. And then he told Rickon that “blind boys seethe with anger, and angry boys go blind,” but he was always saying stupid things like that, so Rickon threatened to set Shaggydog on him. Maggon Magos laughed, revealing a set of sharp yellow teeth. He slung Rickon over his shoulder and marched him back to camp, the direwolf trotting docilely behind them. Rickon glared at Shaggydog as he hung over Maggon Magos’ back. “ _Traitor_ ,” he hissed, but the giant black wolf just lolled his tongue at him innocently.

So Rickon was used to Maggon Magos’ stupid little sayings, and today it was, “The spear is part of you.”

“Throw it from your heart, not your head,” he said, “but do not throw the spear, throw yourself.”

Rickon threw his head back, rolling his eyes in exasperation. “I _know_ ,” he said through gritted teeth, “you’ve already told me that _seven times_ , but you won’t tell me _how_.” His nostrils flared as he fought to handle his temper.

“I cannot tell you how,” Maggon Magos said, maddeningly calm. “You must discover how yourself.”

Rickon lifted his spear (no, his _arm_ ) again, and squinted at their makeshift target, a deer skin stretched tight between two trees. He breathed deeply, in and out, and tried to feel as calm as Maggon Magos. He shifted back and turned ( _the preparation_ ), twisted through his core and stepped forward ( _the action_ ), exhaled and leaned into the throw, releasing his arm ( _the closure_ ). The spear whistled as it arced true and steady in the direction his hand pointed, which unfortunately was too high and off to the right. It struck the tree’s trunk with a loud _ping_ and reverberated a few seconds. Maggon Magos laughed.

“That would’ve hit,” Rickon declared. “Did you see my throw? It was perfect! Only my aim was off a bit.”

“But your aim was weak, so your throw was weak,” Maggon Magos said. “Did you hit the target, or did you hit the tree?”

Rickon glared at him, fuming. “You’re just the _worst_ ,” he spat, but he said it in the Common Tongue. He wasn’t _afraid_ of Maggon Magos; he just didn’t see what good it would do to provoke him, that was all.

He threw the spear all afternoon while Maggon Magos watched. Shaggydog ran to retrieve it after each throw until he grew bored with the game and slinked off in the icy forest to hunt. The deer hide was in tatters by the time Maggon Magos was satisfied with Rickon’s form. “That is good,” he said approvingly after the spear sliced through the scrap of hide and jabbed cleanly into the hard ground ten feet past. “You make a lot of noise about it, boy, but you learn fast.”

Rickon allowed himself a triumphant smile and ran through the slushy woods to retrieve his spear. When he returned, Maggon Magos was already walking up the hill toward the tree line. “Come on, boy,” he called over his shoulder, “We have been too long away and will be late for the gathering. I’m too generous of my time with you.” Rickon snorted indignantly, but Maggon Magos continued. “Do I suppose I'm going to make a warrior out of you to protect us from danger? Perhaps a great hunter to feed us through the winter? Is that why I endure your whining and kicking?” He turned, dark beady eyes squinting above his red leathery nose. “I don’t think so. I put up with your tantrums, but you're not one of us. You or your wolf.”

Rickon stopped. Ice crunched beneath his feet. His heart beat very fast, and the tip of his nose burned with cold. He felt the familiar stirrings of anger inside him, anger and something emptier. “You’re going to make me leave, aren’t you?” he accused, and folded fur-covered arms across his chest to keep his hands from trembling. Maggon Magos regarded him calmly.  “Is this is because of the moon gathering? I told you I would eat it, but you wouldn’t let me. I was the only one who didn’t come forward, and they all looked at me and saw! It’s your fault, you _made_ me an outsider!”

“You _are_ an outsider here,” Maggon Magos said, “and not because I didn’t let you eat of winter’s sacrifice. There is power in a moon gathering, boy, and it is almost winter! I would not tempt her wrath by allowing one who has no understanding of our ways to make a mockery of it.”

Rickon lifted his chin at Maggon Magos defiantly, but he had to admit that he _didn't_ understand, not really. He remembered standing beneath the bright full moon with hundreds of people circled on top of a grassy knob at the middle of the island. Black winds scattered twigs and clumps of leaves around their feet, and the light of the moon illuminated the entire world below them: the rocky hills, the tops of trees stretching in all directions, the dark outline of jagged spires towering in the west, and all around at the very edges of the universe, the shimmer of black waves crashing against the coast.

The gathering had walked all day from their camp at the forest’s edge to the grassy knob at the island’s heart. They climbed half the night to reach the top before the moon reached its zenith, summiting to find hundreds already gathered. They stood in circles quietly as the islanders prepared the holy ritual that Rickon didn’t understand.

“The moon gathering is our time to pay respect to life’s forces, to thank them when our lives are prosperous, and to ask for strength to face our troubles with courage,” Maggon Magos told him on their walk inland. “Your men outside the island don't understand the moon gatherings, but even outsiders understand that blood is life and flesh is strength, though they turn up their noses and call us savages. The winter’s moon gathering is different,” he said, panting as they scrambled up a short rocky ledge, trailing the group by a few paces. “At other moon gatherings, only those in need of strength partake of the sacrifice. But at the winter's moon gathering, we know that the coming days will sacrifice many who are weak and many who are strong, so _all_ partake.”

“So you eat dead people,” Rickon had huffed, scrambling up a large rock ahead of Maggon Magos, “and that makes you strong?”

Maggon Magos grunted his way up the cliff.

“What do you do at normal moon gatherings?” Rickon asked, intrigued. “Drink each other’s blood?”

“Yes,” Maggon Magos replied, brushing dirt from his hands. “Those especially compassionate for their neighbor's struggles may offer more.”

“Like what?” Rickon asked avidly.

Maggon Magos shrugged. “I saw a man cut off his arm for his ailing wife.”

“Really?” Rickon thought of Harlos Harlon, the man with four teeth and one arm who lived five tents down from Osha and himself. He snarled every time Shaggydog stalked by, but he had whittled three spears between his two feet and one hand for Rickon to use in the hunt. “Did she live?”

“No,” Maggon Magos turned and strode forward. “Life doesn’t always favor the strong, any more than it does the weak.” There was an edge to his voice, but Rickon disregarded the warning.

“Who are we eating tonight?” Rickon demanded, trotting behind him.

“Someone who offered their death to give life for their brothers and sisters,” Maggon Magos said, rounding on him. “But _you_ , Rickon, you will _not_  partake of the sacrifice.” He grabbed Rickon’s arm and pulled him close, shaving his ruddy nose in Rickon’s face. “Do you hear me, little boy? Step aside when it begins, or I promise I will knock you down.”

Rickon looked up at the islander’s large leathery face and tried to pull his arm from his vicelike grip. Maggon Magos shook him and Rickon stilled. “Why?” he challenged. “I’m one of you now, aren’t I?”

“Because I said so,” Maggon Magos snarled and pushed him away. He turned and strode off to catch up with their group, now almost out of sight. He refused to speak to him again the rest of the journey. Rickon had done as Maggon Magos said and stood aside when the ritual began. When the others, old men and boys younger than him, solemn girls and hardened women, stepped forward to consume the sacrifice under the moon’s pale glare, he stayed apart, alone, different from the rest. And they saw, and they knew him as an outsider, and it was all Maggon Magos’ fault, Maggon Magos who was going to make him leave, to wander again from inn to stable to hovel, homeless and purposeless.

“ _Why_?” he yelled now, stamping his foot. A ruckus of angry caws and fluttering wings replied as a cloud of crows swirled out of the long bare branches surrounding them. “I don’t want to be an outsider anymore. I’ve been here almost a year, and I don’t want to leave! I help Kargoz Magos every morning with the stupid goats, and Osha is a better hunter than anyone at camp. I’ve done everything you’ve told me to, so why are you making me go?”

“I will never make you go,” Maggon Magos told him with a bitter smile. “But winter is not yet come, and I don’t believe it wants you here when it arrives.”

“What are you talking about?” Rickon asked impatiently. “Winter is just snow and ice and cold winds. Winter can’t _decide_  for me!”

Maggon Magos shook his head. “Winter is judgment. And certainly it decides, every day, between life and death.”

“If you mean that people die because of winter,” Rickon said slowly, trying to understand, “then why would you throw me out there alone again, to _die_?”

“Boy,” Maggon Magos closed his eyes. “You’ve been a trial for me, but I feel great satisfaction from knowing you throug your storms and hostility, your distress. I am glad that life chose to set you in my path, though I haven’t had time to teach you enough. But winter is coming,” Maggon Magos sighed, and Rickon felt a foreboding thrill down to his toes. The cold sun shone through the branches, slivers of light falling on Rickon where he stood in a slushy pile of dead leaves.

He caught up to Maggon Magos at the crest of the hill, where One-Horn’s pen stood along the edge of the forest. Shaggydog reappeared and prowled outside the crude fence, sniffing and growling. The wolf could have easily jumped it, but Rickon always held him back for Maggon Magos’ sake.

“Why do you like One-Horn so much, anyway?” he called out. Maggon Magos stopped and regarded the feeble old goat with an indulgent smile. “You should let Shaggydog have him,” Rickon continued audaciously, “he’d get over that fence and through his neck in a second.”

Maggon Magos turned on him, eyes flashing. “You control that wolf, boy, or I will control him for you,” he snarled.

It was Rickon’s turn to laugh in his face. “You couldn’t,” he challenged.

The man set his jaw, beard bristling. “I would try,” he declared. “It’s rude to threaten another man’s pet. It’s like threatening his own child.”

Rickon felt suddenly ashamed. “I’m sorry,” he said, “I didn’t think of it like that. But One-Horn is so _stupid_ , look!” He poked his hand through a gap in the fence and clutched a brown, half-eaten apple. “One-Horn!” he called, and the shaggy white goat looked at him with wide blue eyes. “A treat, see?” He held up the apple, and the goat’s eyes locked on it, captivated. Rickon tossed it slowly between them. The apple hit him square in the nose and plopped to the ground at his feet. One-Horn looked around dumbly for it, and then back at Rickon, who turned to Maggon Magos, justified. “He’s just a dumb old goat with one horn! Why do you care about him so much?”

Maggon Magos turned toward camp, so Rickon hurried to walk beside him. “I care about One-Horn because he is special,” Maggon Magos said with great dignity, “and because unique and innocent things sometimes need protecting.” He looked down at Rickon, his beard twitching slightly. “And because it is fun to throw things at him,” he admitted.

Rickon smiled and slipped his fingers in Maggon Magos’ gloved hand. He felt a gentle squeeze as they passed the boundary of their camp.

Kargoz Magos was at the evening milking. She looked up and called out to them with a smile. Maggon Magos replied to her taunting question with such an indecent challenge that Rickon blushed and hurried toward his tent. Skarlos Harlon and her little girl bobbed their heads anxiously as they walked past the main fire. Harlos Harlon met them at the camp’s center with a stony face.

“Where have you been?” he asked. “It’s well past gathering.”

“I’m sorry, neighbor,” Maggon Magos replied. “I let the boy’s lesson get away from me.”

Harlos Harlon snorted. “I told you it wouldn’t be any use to _us_ ,” he spat.

Maggon Magos stiffened. Rickon saw Osha standing outside their tent with arms crossed, her thin lips set in a line. He ran, glad to see her again.

“Osha!” he shouted. “I hit the target ten times in a row! You should have _seen_ it, Osha, I sent the spear whistling through the air like a knife!”

Osha looked down at him, her mouth relaxing. “That so?” she asked.

“What’s wrong?” he said, noticing the blade at her hip and the axe in her hand. She caught Maggon Magos’ gaze behind him.

“He’s come to take you home,” Osha replied.

‘ _Winter is coming,_ ’ Maggon Magos had said. “What do you mean?” Rickon asked. “This is home now, Osha. Who is here?”

She sighed and opened the coarse flap of their tent. “A southerner,” she said.

He pushed his way inside, eyes adjusting slowly to the darkened space. A man stood stiffly next to his bed. He bobbed his head and took a step forward at Rickon’s entrance. “I'm glad to find you safe and whole, m’lord,” he said.

“Who are you?” Rickon asked. Osha and Maggon Magos stepped through the tent’s flap behind him.

“I was born Davos Seaworth of Fleabottom,” he answered. “I wasn’t much but a smuggler before my King made me a knight and a lord.”

“Why did he do that?” Rickon asked.

“He said it was for my good service to him,” Davos replied. “King Stannis is a just man. He fights now to save the North.”

Rickon furrowed his brow. Osha stepped forward, her jaw set threateningly. “Which king is this man Stannis?” she demanded. “Last we heard, five kings or more it seemed there was, all marching south to play at swords. What does m’lord have to do with them?”

“Kings often take great interest in princes,” the slight man said seriously.

Kings and princes, knights and lords. Rickon hadn’t heard such words for months, and he hadn't missed them.

“What do you want with me?” Rickon asked.

“King Stannis would have you go to White Harbor, m’lord. House Manderly will help you take Winterfell from Roose Bolton,” Davos said. At Rickon’s blank look, he hurried to add, “Bolton was appointed Warden of the North by King Joffrey.”

Rickon remembered a thin boy with a pointed chin and hair like straw. He had snapped at Robb and laughed at Bran. “If Stannis is King, why is Joffrey King too?” he asked.

“King Joffrey is dead. He choked at his own wedding, though some believe he was poisoned. That was the night your sister, Lady Sansa, escaped King’s Landing.” _Sansa_. He remembered long copper hair and being sung to sleep. He thought about the other one, too, the one with dark hair and darker eyes, who taught him how to climb a tree and chased him around the yard. _What was her name?_ “His brother, Tommen, sits on the Iron Throne now, but the Lannister power is flagging. It won’t be long before the Kingdom turns to King Stannis.”

“Why would King Stannis have _me_ take back Winterfell? It belongs to my brother Robb,” Rickon said obstinately.

Davos gaped at him, and his eyes flicked briefly to Osha and Maggon Magos behind him. “I... I thought you would have heard by now...” he started uncertainly. Rickon narrowed his eyes and waited. “Your brother Robb and his army, and- and your mother too, they were...” He swallowed quickly. “They were massacred at the Twins, m’lord, at your uncle’s wedding to Walder Frey’s daughter.”

The pause was thick between them. Rickon crossed his arms over his chest and glared at the man. Davos shifted uncomfortably.

“I know,” Rickon finally muttered. He had wanted to hear Davos say it, for some reason. And now that he’d heard it, he didn’t feel any different from before. Still empty, a helpless fury simmering below. “I knew it was going to happen, but Robb didn’t keep me with him,” he said, and a shadow prowled along the edge of the tent. “He let them lock me up, and I howled and howled to let him know that it was wrong, it was going to go bad.” Lord Davos listened so intently he didn’t notice the wolf circling them. “But he ignored me, and they cut him up and didn’t even stab me clean in the heart. They sliced my neck open, and I heard it all, the screams and yells, the fighting and crying and dying, while my life dripped out my throat.” He cupped his neck unthinkingly, and Shaggydog growled, baring his teeth when Davos turned and jumped back.

“Gods!” he gasped, “The wolf!” He made to take another step backward, but Rickon placed his palms on the man’s back and held him in place. “What are you-” he began, twisting around to look at him, but Osha stepped forward to take his left arm, while Maggon Magos took his right.

“My brother Robb didn’t listen to his wolf,” Rickon said as Shaggydog approached, sniffing the air, “so he didn’t know he was surrounded by enemies until it was too late.” Shaggy reared up and placed his paws on the man’s chest. The wolf nosed his large wet muzzle around his face while Davos trembled. Shaggy pulled back, looked him straight in the eye and snarled. Rickon heard Davos’ breath catch in his throat, but Shaggy just swiped at the man’s nose with his tongue, dropped back to the floor and prowled out through the tent’s opening, sniffing the ground curiously.

Osha stepped away. Rickon caught her eye and she nodded at him. Maggon Magos looked down at Davos.

“Looks like you passed,” he said.

“It appears so,” Lord Davos agreed gratefully.

“The boy did the same to me, the first time we met,” Maggon Magos continued. “Him come a beggar, with death skulking at his side to tear my throat out if I didn’t give him what he wanted.” He turned to look at Rickon. “But I passed, didn’t I? This man has too. You should trust him.”

“He passed _Shaggy’s_ test,” Rickon said. “He hasn’t passed mine yet.” He put his hands on his hips. “I will go back with you,” he declared. “And Osha and Shaggydog, too, of course.” His eyes flicked briefly to Maggon Magos. “I don’t care about your King, and I don’t promise to help him if I don’t want to. But I do want to go back to Winterfell and watch as Shaggy rips the men apart who stole it from my brothers. I want to see their blood.” He glared. “And I’ll watch as Shaggy rips out your throat, too, if you try to stop me.” He paused, remembering something. “What about my sisters?” he asked. “You said Sansa escaped Joffrey’s wedding. Where is she? And the other one...” He tried vainly to think of her name again. “What happened to her?”

“I don’t know, m’lord,” Davos said carefully. “No one's heard of Lady Sansa since she left King’s Landing, though many have searched for her. And your sister Arya has been lost since before your father’s execution.”

“Arya?” Rickon said doubtfully. “No, that’s not it.” She had yellow eyes and a thousand little cousins. She was queen, and warrior, and death. “Nymeria!” he said suddenly. “That was her name.”

“Your sister’s name was Arya,” Davos said gently. “Your younger sister.”

“No, that can’t be right,” Rickon said stubbornly. “Her name _is_ Nymeria, and she’s alive.” The man looked as if he would argue with him again, so he turned to the bed and gathered his few possessions: a short steel knife, which he strapped to his waist, a frozen velvet pouch of coins he’d hidden beneath the cot, and a thick fur cloak he wrapped about himself tightly. Osha was pulling on woolen gloves. She held a second pair out to him. He accepted them and pushed outside.

“Maggon Magos,” he said, “I should be able to hunt my own prey now without Shaggydog. Do you think so?”

“I do,” he agreed behind him. Rickon heard a _swoosh_ and the thud of steel in dirt. He turned and saw Maggon Magos’ spear goring the ground at his feet. “Take it,” he said. “And remember to respect the hunt.”

“It’s too big for me,” Rickon protested.

“Not forever,” Maggon Magos replied. Rickon gripped the cold handle and yanked it from the dirt. He staggered backwards and almost fell over his feet when it came loose. It was too long for him, but lighter than he’d expected. He set it against his shoulder and looked up at Maggon Magos with a smile. Crinkles etched the man’s gaze as he looked back at Rickon.

“Winter is coming, little boy,” he said. “I hope my spear will be of some use when it finds you.” He brushed past him toward the tree line, walking slowly to One-Horn’s pen, a lonely figure among the growing shadows stretching down the hill.

Rickon turned and headed in the opposite direction, past Osha and Lord Davos. They fall in behind him. He heard the Southerner's sharp intake of breath when Shaggy slinked up next to them.

“I'm afraid we'll be walking most of the night to reach my ship, m’lord,” Davos said apologetically. “Are you sure you want to carry that spear? It doesn't appear to fit you.”

Rickon hitched the shaft higher over his right shoulder, the head bobbing threateningly at the Southerner’s face with each step. “Shut up,” he said, “and take me home.”


	4. Alayne II

“Please,” she gasped, grasping at the older woman’s hand. She was so close, _she must help me_. “Lord Robert is ailing, and I fear for his health here at the Gates, and under my father’s protection-”

“Stop that, girl,” the woman snapped, brushing her hand away. “I know who you are, and I know who your father was, and your mother, and your uncle, and I most certainly know that little worm calling himself Protector of the Vale is not your kin.”

“So do I,” Sansa responded fiercely, “and my _lord father_ will kill my cousin, the last of my blood.”

Lady Dustin leaned back in her tall, handsome chair, regarding her with cold eyes, swirling the wine in her silver cup, _slosh, slosh, slosh_. The lady was as tall and handsome as the seat she perched, straight backed and rigid. Streaks of silver shot through her long brown hair; her thick red lips set in a haughty line. Her gown was dark green, cut wide on her shoulders, dagged sleeves pooling around her wrists. _Slosh, slosh_ , went the wine, dripping over the steel lip here and there and down her thick fingers. Lady Dustin lifted hand and chin and drained the glass in three languid swallows, reproachful eyes never leaving Sansa’s face.

“I don’t give a damn about you,” she remarked with a sneer stained purple. She set her cup down on the rough stone table between them and leaned forward. “I don’t give a damn about you or your family. All you Starks are the same, aren’t you? _I have to help you_ , you demand, and nary a word said of what _I_ stand to gain, what it benefits me or _my_ family. Help the Starks, honor demands it the North still believes, but how fares the North now? Do you have the slightest notion of the complete mess your father left us in, when he rode South to meddle in other people’s affairs? What is King’s Landing to us?”

Lady Dustin glared at her, her substantial bust rising with each labored breath. Sansa noticed crow’s feet crinkling her scowl and long straight lines folding her flesh from temple to jaw. Her mouth was swollen, a ruddy red glow high on her cheeks. Myranda had surrendered and gone to bed half an hour ago, but Sansa had subtly filled her own glass with water as many times as with wine, though the northern woman drank long and heavy.

“My lord husband followed Eddard Stark to that cursed Tower of Joy, as far South as one can go in Westeros, did you know?” Sansa didn’t have time to shake her head. “My husband was a warrior,” the Northern woman continued resentfully. “It was his duty to fight for his liege lord, for the North. There is integrity in fighting a war to protect what is yours and what you love, even for principles you believe in, and I am proud of my William, my warrior, though he gave me no children and failed in the end.” Lady Dustin’s hands clenched, and she shook her head, a bitter look on her long face. “But Eddard Stark took him to a place he had no business, to a fight he could not possibly survive, leagues away from his home and his family, and left him there to rot in the bloodbath he died in, further South than any Northman should ever be. He lies now in the South, if he was even buried at all.”

Lady Dustin’s sour rage was pronounced, and it frightened Sansa that it was directed at her. She tried to think what to say, what the proud, northern woman wanted from her.

“My father-” she began, but Lady Dustin cut her off.

“Your father is dead, I know. You’ll forgive me if I confess I did not weep for him.” Sansa felt a trickle of white-hot anger seep down into her belly, flickering among the fear, but she kept her mouth closed and held the woman’s glare, the air dense with contempt. “Lord Eddard Stark will not be returning to Winterfell alive, that is certain.” Lady Dustin’s gaze flicked quickly from Sansa’s left eye to her right and back again. “Nor will he be returning in death. I recovered his remains when they came to Moat Cailin with a sect of Silent Sisters. But my husband’s bones never returned home, and Lord Stark was so enamored of the South, wound up in all their campaigns and crusades, I felt there must have been some mistake. I claimed possession of his bones there and brought them with me on my way to White Harbor. It was a quick and straightforward detour to toss him in the Bite.”

The lady leaned back against her chair once more, eyes alight with a drunken sort of triumph. Sansa wondered how long Lady Dustin’s bitterness had festered, and if Lord Eddard had been the first Stark to offend her so deeply. She wondered how little power Lady Dustin held over her own circumstances, that stealing away to dump a box of her former overlord’s crumbly old bones in the sea could feel like such a victory.

“I am told the Freys threw my mother in the Green Fork after murdering her, my brother, and my brother’s soldiers at my uncle’s wedding,” Sansa said lightly, swallowing her self-righteous anger. “Perhaps her body will wash up next to his. I am grateful for your attempt to reunite their remains, as it was their wish to be laid to rest together.”

“The Green Fork does not discharge into the Bite, you stupid child.” Her sneer was tinged with irritation at Sansa’s lackluster response. “And I did not intend to-”

“I know what you intended,” Sansa snapped. “You intended to bring shame and pain to the Starks, to leave our grief unresolved and unsettled, as you were left. It doesn’t escape me that you did not seek vengeance while my father was alive, but returned his negligence of your husband upon his death, when happenstance placed him in your power.” There was an ugly look on Lady Dustin’s weathered face, but she listened as Sansa continued in a measured tone. “What I do not know is what you want from me, or what you possibly think to gain by telling me these things, or why you believe one further humiliation, one more paltry degradation to my family’s name will break me now, and I frankly do not understand why you think you have nothing to gain from helping me.”

Lady Dustin looked at Sansa for a long while, studying her as if to gauge the steel of her spine. “Tell me, then.” She licked the corner of her mouth, a quick flick of her tongue. “What do I have to gain from helping you?”

Two nights later, after Lady Dustin had departed with her small retinue of sworn swords and servants, Alayne knocked on the door of Maester Coleman’s solar.

“My dear Alayne!” he exclaimed, standing in the doorway, his heavy black cloak tied loosely at the waist, thick chains hanging long from his equally long neck. “To what do I owe the unexpected pleasure of your company?”

“May I enter, Maester Colemon?” she asked him with sweet solemnity.

“Of course, my dear, of course,” he stepped back to allow her entrance. He was a tall, thin man with stooped shoulders and knobby fingers, and the few wisps of hair falling about his sallow face were oiled and stringy. His was not an altogether pleasant countenance to look upon, but neither did Alayne find it ominous. She paused at the center of the solar, next to the table where she and Robert took their lessons, and felt suddenly nervous.

_Can I be sure he is trustworthy_ _?_ She glanced about the drafty room, its swept stone floors, piles of parchment arranged neatly in boxes on the desks, baskets full of quills and bottles of ink at the foot of each table, books lined methodically against the walls. Maester Colemon was painstakingly tidy, though he customarily left the windows open, even tonight, when the air was more than crisp with the frosty bite of approaching winter. The night’s frigid breeze scattered scrolls across his desk and caused the flames in the fireplace to flicker and sputter.

“Would you like a cup of tea, Alayne?” he asked her cordially. “Or a cup of wine?”

“Tea would be lovely, good maester,” she responded, sitting at her study table and breathing in the winter chill. It raised the hair on her arms and the back of her neck, pricked her nipples against the scratchy wool of her dress, and made her knees bob up and down frantically, but it was not uncomfortable. The wintry winds centered her. Her nostrils flared as resolution built. _I must trust him_ , she thought. _For Robert. There is no other choice_. She shivered.

“Would you like to sit by the fire, dear?” the maester asked, setting the kettle on. “Or should I close the drapes?”

“No, thank you, it is not a bother. The chill, the cold clean air, it... it reminds me of home.”

“The septry where you grew up?” Maester Coleman asked, twisting a handful of crunchy green leaves into two cups. “I rather thought that was a bit further south from here. Was it a drafty place? Or perhaps you meant, the cleansing chill of being surrounded by lives dedicated to the Seven?” He looked up and caught her eye, a playful smile on his face.

“No,” Alayne said firmly, “that is not what I meant.”

He raised his eyebrows at her, hands full of tea leaves stilling above their mugs.

“Maester Colemon,” she said, “how long have you served the Arryns?”

He brushed the crumbs from his palms. “Ever since I left the Citadel, twenty-two years ago.”

“Were you close with Lord Jon?”

“I... I served him as best I could, and respected him a great deal. He was a good man, Lord Jon, a good Hand to King Robert, a good lord to his subjects.”

“A good father to his son?”

The maester sat at his desk across from her. “You’ve taken great pains with Lord Robert, my dear Alayne. His recent improvements in temperament and judgment at your hands have been nothing short of miraculous. Lord Jon Arryn loved his boy and wished to see him with better company. But my Lord was a busy man, with many cares and responsibilities, and he was not much around to instruct or discipline his son.”

“Have you noticed any changes in Lord Robert’s health, throughout your years with him? Was he stronger at King’s Landing? Did his fits increase after his father’s death?”

“He has never been strong,” Maester Colemon said thoughtfully, “but I suppose he did not shake so much in King’s Landing.”

_Not until he came to the Eyrie_ , Alayne mused, _and his mother gave him whatever would make him calm and happy_. The kettle began to steam. The maester rose to retrieve it and carefully poured the boiling water in each cup. Alayne accepted hers gratefully and brought the rim to her nose, closing her eyes as the spiced steam washed over her face. She took a cautious sip and set the cup down, wrapping her hands around the sides for warmth.

“Maester Colemon, there is something I need from you,” she said, “and there is little within my power I would not be willing to give you in return for it.”

The maester’s eyebrows raised again, giving his long face the look of a surprised, sallow cucumber.

“My dear?” he asked.

“I need you to promise me that sweetsleep, dreamwine, any such drug will never again pass Lord Robert’s lips. He must never have any of it again. I’ve suspected for some time that the doses his mother gave him were only suffocating his fits for a while and exacerbating the illness in the long term. The boy has had more dreamwine than any grown man should have in his lifetime.”

“I understand your concerns, Alayne, and I have expressed them myself...” Maester Colemon’s lips tightened. “However,” he continued reluctantly, “Lord Baelish is convinced that Robert does not suffer lasting damage from the doses.”

“My _father_ ,” Alayne said, “does not have anyone’s best interests at heart aside from his own.”

Maester Colemon took another sip of tea and cocked his head to the side, regarding her behind the rim of his cup. “Where did you say that septry where you grew up was located, my dear?”

Alayne rose from her seat and moved to peer out the far window. The night was full dark now, the moon’s pale light washing out the surrounding hills and fields so that it looked as though a thin blanket of snow settled from the Gates to the mountains. “Winter is coming, good maester,” she observed.

When she turned back, he was on his feet, mouth slightly agape. “My lady?” he started.

“ _Alayne_ ,” she rebuffed. “He must be strong, Maester Colemon. He has not had sweetsleep in the two months my _father_ has been gone, and his fits have subsided, not significantly, but a bit I think. When Lord Baelish returns, Robert will become agitated, and my father will command you to medicate him. You must, please, you must not give him another drug, no matter what my father tells you. He must be strong!”

The maester regarded her with wide eyes. “I see it now,” he breathed, “I cannot understand how I didn’t see it before. You look so like her, your mother, Lady Catelyn.”

“Maester Colemon-”

“I promise,” he said quickly. “I promise, my lady- Alayne. I will find some way to deceive him, should he ask me to give the boy more dreamwine. I have long felt that its effects were more harmful to my lord than helpful, but I- I have always been one to serve, not question.”

“I understand,” she told him, “but it is important, now more than ever, that we keep his blood clean, that we take extra heed for his health and stamina.”

He squinted at her. “Now more than ever?” he asked. His eyes went round and he placed both hands on the table, leaning toward her. “You mean to take him from here.”

Alayne set her jaw. “That is my plan,” she conceded, “if it is what Lord Robert wants. I’m needed elsewhere, and this place is not safe for me when my father returns.”

“It’s not safe to _travel_ , my lady, not with a war still being fought around the realm and ice beginning to fall from the sky!”

“If we do not go soon,” she agreed, “we will not go at all.”

They stood there for a moment, regarding each other carefully.

“There is something I want,” Maester Colemon decided, “in return for my promise.”

Alayne nodded and tried not to feel disappointed.

“I would go with you and Lord Robert.”

Days passed, and then weeks. Good Lord Robert grew in weight and liveliness, and so did great lord Robert. Her little cousin took the dog with him everywhere, to the hall when he took his meals, to Maester Colemon’s solar when he took his lessons, to play outside and to sleep in his room, to sit at his feet or roam nearby, curiously sniffing and licking at each new place and person, and Robert even taught him to ‘sit’ and ‘lay down’, though ‘stay’ didn’t interest the pup. Only twice did Lord Robert leave his little dog’s mess indoors and unattended, and both times Alayne took the pup from him for the night.

“Good Lord Robert is yours to care for and play with, my lord,” she told him when he begged her to give him back after it happened the second time, tears rolling down his cheeks. “He is your friend, but also your responsibility. We cannot take comfort from those we neglect.”

That night, Alayne almost hoped her cousin would forget to clean up after Good Lord Robert again, so warm and cuddly was the little pup curled up at her side. She wondered if she should get a dog for herself; after all, it had been a long time since Lady had died. _A hound perhaps_ , like the scarred, grumpy mutt that had comforted her at the Fingers. She breathed in the soothing mixture of fur, dirt and sweat and fell asleep smiling.

Weeks passed, and then months. Lord Robert could tell her the names, histories, crops and livelihoods of all the great Houses of the Vale, and he could shear a sheep and even spin a bit. He had taken to the shepherd of the fields adjacent to the Gates of the Moon, a tall old man with bright blue eyes and a beard as white and straggly as his wooly charges, after one day they had found Good Lord Robert merrily running circles around the flock, nipping at their hooves.

“What is he doing?” her cousin asked, breathless from the steep climb, when they came upon the man watching the scene with a smile crinkling his face.

The man turned and dipped his head. “Your pup is quite the lively little shepherd, m’lord,” he said. “Suppose I’ll find myself out of a job soon enough.”

They watched Good Lord Robert, bounding around and around the flock with so much energy that Alayne grew weary. The Lords Robert began spending a few hours each day outdoors with the shepherd and his flock, playing across the fields as the air grew colder and the winds fiercer. She knew there were mutterings that it wasn’t proper for a little lord to play with livestock, but she saw the color on her cousin’s cheeks and the muscles forming on his thin limbs, and she did not care who else approved.

Alayne was once again sitting with Maester Colemon, practicing a set and sling on herself, when there was a knock on the door and Duana entered in a bit of a frenzy.

“Lord Baelish just arrived, m’lady,” she said. “He’s sitting down to sup just now and asked that you come see him.”

Maester Colemon nodded at her gravely, and she quickly piled the sling on his desk.

“Of course, Duana, I will follow you down.”

Lord Littlefinger had already finished his soup and was cutting his meat when she approached.

“My darling Alayne!” he exclaimed magnanimously and rose with arms stretched wide. She went to him dutifully and returned his enthusiastic embrace. “You are a sight to soothe a harried soul, dear daughter.” She smiled up at him as he brushed her hair behind her ear and held his dinner knife at her back.

“Lord father, it is good to see you again,” she said, compelling herself to grasp his hand at her cheek and squeeze gently.

He smiled widely and gestured for her to sit with him, calling for a second cup of wine.

“I am sorry I haven’t been able to write to you these past few months. Business and duty have dragged me away and required all my attention.”

“Business has gone well, I trust?” she asked lightly, gingerly sipping the Arbor gold.

“Well enough,” he sighed, “though things are moving a bit more quickly that I would have liked. Have you heard that Cersei is going to trial against the Faith?”

Alayne blinked at him. “The Queen?” she asked dumbly.

“The Queen _Regent_ , my sweet, but no longer. Kevan Lannister took over the regency when Cersei was imprisoned, and then convinced the new High Septon, a zealous little sparrow, to release her if she confessed to the sin of infidelity.” Littlefinger chuckled. “Not that any doubted she was guilty of _that_. The septas pulled her out of her cell, shaved her bald as a baby, and set her to walk naked from the High Septry to the Red Keep.” Littlefinger laughed again, a light gleaming feverishly in his eye. Alayne felt nauseated. “The crowd feasted on the sight of their proud queen exposed in her disgrace, and flung shit and insults at her, mile after mile. They say she ran up the hill to the Keep like a deranged cat, sobbing and spitting, uselessly trying to cover herself.” He shook his head, a vile, satisfied smirk on his face, and drank deeply. “Queen Cersei’s rule has ended. Only the trial remains to determine if her life will end with it.”

Alayne forced herself to smile at him foolishly, though she felt like retching. Was justice a ruse, a sham with no meaning, that Cersei’s holy punishment should be so contemptible?

“Any word of her brother?” she asked.

Littlefinger’s smirk slid from his face, replaced by an irritated grimace. “None, unless you were referring to her one-handed brother, though reports of Ser Jaime are muddled as well. He ended the siege of Riverrun for Lord Emmon Frey, packed Edmure Tully and Jeyne Westerling off to Casterly Rock, though the Blackfish slipped through his five remaining fingers, and rode to Raventree. He settled yet another siege there and rode out with a small retinue including Tytos Blackwood’s son, when apparently he set off on his own a day later. No concrete reports of him have been heard since.”

_Joffrey dead, Tyrion fled, Cersei fallen, and Jaime lost_. In spite of herself, Sansa felt a flicker of savage delight.

“What is more,” Littlefinger sighed, and Alayne noticed for the first time that he was exhausted, though he hid it well, “reports from King’s Landing are often confused, and word from Dorne and the Free Cities has grown so ludicrously unbelievable that I can almost believe it. The Faith armed again, a mute monster of a man whose face no one has seen appointed to the _Kingsguard_ , sailor’s talk of dragons and krakens, red priests fanning the flames at Slaver’s Bay... Why, it is almost enough to convince me to abandon you here and return to King’s Landing.”

_Go_ , Alayne thought, _don’t come back_.

“I hear you’ve had a visitor from home, my sweet,” he said, and ice dripped down her tummy.

“Me? Oh, the Lady Dustin, you mean,” she responded innocently. “No, she was here to see Lord Nestor, and spoke mostly with Lady Myranda when she realized the lord was away. Something about gold, or was it gold corn? Trade from White Harbor, lord father,” she babbled.

Littlefinger narrowed his eyes at her and gripped the steel flagon to splash more white wine in her cup.

“And you were not interested in speaking with her? Did you not gently question her about conditions in White Harbor, and the North?”

“Myranda did invite me to sup with them her last night here,” she said carefully. “And Lady Dustin was not reticent in speaking about the North.”

“So? What did you learn, my astute little sweetling? How is our grim, wintry kingdom?”

“Desolate,” she said sadly, like he wanted her to. “The Northmen are scattered and weak, only one in five come back from King Robb’s war. The last harvests were not nearly plentiful enough, the snows have begun to set in, and Roose Bolton holds Winterfell. His appalling bastard recently joined their forces after taking Moat Cailin back from the Ironmen.” She paused and slumped her shoulders, turned her lips down and settled her lashes low over her eyes, the perfect picture of dejection. She was hardly pretending. “I suppose I should be glad the Ironmen no longer hold the Neck. But Lady Dustin told such tales of Ramsay Snow, I thought I would die from hearing them.” She shivered and thought of Donella Hornwood, locked in a tower and starving. She didn’t want to think about the rest.

Littlefinger took another sip, smacked his lips, and sighed artfully. “Did Lady Dustin tell you that the newly legitimized Ramsay Bolton married your sister at Winterfell not two months ago?” He made the remark as if it were no more personal to her than a comment about the weather.

Sansa studied him and nodded slowly. “Yes, but I do not believe that. Arya is dead. She’s been dead for years now.”

Littlefinger looked satisfied. “My poor sweet girl, with no one to love, no one to care for her, all alone but for her devoted father.” He took a lock of her hair and curled it in a dull brown spool around his finger. “It’s a good thing you are here and not in the North, don’t you think? What a frightening, dangerous place that would be for you just now.” His eyes flicked to her mouth, and he tugged her insistently closer by the hair snarled in his hand.

Alayne moistened her lips nervously. She closed her eyes, ready for it to be over.

A clatter in the hall made them both jump. Littlefinger pushed her away, cursing under his breath. Good Lord Robert came bounding up to them and jumped on the table, sniffing eagerly at Littlefinger’s face.

“What the-” he started, but her cousin came sprinting into the room and stopped dead at the sight of his pup, now enthusiastically licking Littlefinger’s plate.

“You!” Lord Robert exclaimed.

“Me,” Littlefinger replied. “I see you’ve made a friend at last.”

Lord Robert’s eyes jumped between them. Alayne caught his gaze, willing him to keep his composure.

Littlefinger pushed the dog from his plate, but held onto his collar, keeping him firmly in his grip.

“That’s... that’s Good Lord Robert,” Robert told him. “Alayne gave him to me. I’ve taken care of him for three months now.”

“How delightful,” Littlefinger said, studying her cousin. “Perhaps you can teach Good Lord Robert to stay outdoors and away from people’s dinners. Come here, my lord, let’s have a look at you.” Robert paused, uncertain. “Yes, _you_ , Robert, not the dog. Come here.”

Robert stepped up across the table from Lord Littlefinger. Alayne could see the tension in his neck, his hands trembling. Littlefinger reached over the table and gripped Robert’s jaw, turning his face this way and that. Alayne knew his sharp eyes missed nothing, not the color in Robert’s cheek or his taut, clear skin, not the muscle around his shoulders or the luster in his dark brown hair.

“You look well, Robert,” Littlefinger stated. He sounded far from pleased. “What has brought about this change in you?”

Robert blinked, Littlefinger still clutching his jaw. “I- I don’t know,” he said. “I’ve been doing my lessons with Maester Colemon and my chores with Alayne, just like before, my lord. The only thing different is Good Lord Robert.”

“Well, must it be the dog that is so beneficial to your health, Lord Robert? Perhaps your eternal separation from your mother has done you good after all, just as your father always thought it would.”

Alayne couldn’t help the gasp that escaped her at his words. _You are so rude_ , she wanted to say. _You are unkind and ungenerous, only concerned for yourself, and I find you completely vile_. But she kept her mouth shut and schooled her features into an expression of contrition, for Littlefinger’s eyes slid to her and she could read on his face what he was thinking, clear as day. _Perhaps it’s not the dog, or the dead mother; perhaps it’s you_.

“Go on, Robert,” he said finally, still looking at Alayne. “Put the dog in the stables for the night and see to your evening chores.”

Two tears were sliding down Lord Robert’s cheeks, and at Littlefinger’s words, he looked utterly wretched. “But- but Good Lord Robert... he sleeps with me, my lord, in... in my room, every night.” His voice was just above a whisper.

“I think not,” Littlefinger replied coolly. “You almost look a proper little lord now, it’s time you start acting like one. Go.”

Robert went, clutching the pup, his face in Good Lord Robert’s neck to hide his tears.

Silence stretched between them. Alayne wondered if he was shifting plans in his head already, to account for Robert’s unforeseen well-being. She tried to look oblivious.

“How long has it been since his last fit, Alayne?” he asked her suddenly.

“Four days,” she lied automatically.

“Was he attended to by Maester Colemon?”

“Oh, yes,” she said dolefully. “It was such a bad episode, my lord, the maester had to give him something to help him sleep for the night.” She sighed wistfully. “I had hoped we would be able to cut him off one of these days, but it does not seem to be possible.” She couldn’t tell whether or not he believed her. “I had better see to my own chores, my lord.” She started to rise.

“This Council, for which I’ve returned,” he said. “I trust you understand that it will be momentous for us. I know you will not disappoint me, Alayne.”

She tipped her head and walked out. _It will be momentous_ , she thought, _one way or the other_.


	5. Jon II

She slid toward him, her steps slow and careful. Cold wind stirred strands of hair about her shoulders. Seven hundred feet of empty air dropped below on either side.

Jon watched her approach and willed himself not to blink as icy gusts swirled flakes of snow in his eyes, for fear that she would disappear, for fear that she would leave him, for fear that he would find himself once more alone, empty and cold, and cold, and cold.

Crystals caught in his throat when she smiled, revealing crooked teeth, two small dimples creasing her flushed cheeks.

She stopped in front of him, so close their boots nearly touched. Jon felt her warm breath on his neck, and he smiled, the unfamiliar gesture stretching unused muscles. A quiver was slung on her back, the white bow resting on her shoulder. She wore heavy black trousers and a thick fur cloak, her bright red hair the only spark of color along the length of the gray Wall stretching endlessly ahead and behind.

He brushed his fingertips across her cheek. _She’s so warm_ , he marveled, shivering.

“You’ll catch your death up here, Jon Snow,” she reproached him. “What are you doing on all this ice?”

“I was waiting for you,” he laughed.

“Waiting for _me_?” she exclaimed, waggling her eyebrows. “I always thought so.”

“You knew me so well,” he said, and caught himself.

She looked at him with warm eyes, her hair swirling like a sputtering fire, a soft tendril brushing against Jon’s mouth. His lips opened at the touch. He gazed at her and wondered if he would remember the curve of her round face, the little knob at the end of her nose, the way her unruly hair flickered like a welcoming candle in the night, when he woke again the next morning.

“I wanted to know you better,” Ygritte admitted.

Jon wrapped his hand around the back of her neck and closed the distance between them. Her lips were cracked and chapped, but she smiled against his mouth and spread her fingers to span the small of his back. When she pushed a hand under the band of his trousers, he laughed and clutched her closer, settling his forehead on her shoulder, nudging his nose against her neck. She smelled of sweat and dirt and defiance.

“I’ve missed you,” he said and tried not to cry.

“Jon Snow,” she sighed, pressing her cheek to his. “I was wrong about you.”

He kissed her again. A cold wind snapped through his cloak and fluttered the hair on his arms beneath his wool shirt. Ygritte wrapped her slender arms around him and pressed her body close, and Jon thought he almost remembered what it was to feel warm.

He sighed into her mouth. Her tongue against his was a brand. He pushed his hips against hers, wanting, hungry. He moved his hand under her cloak to grasp her breast. His fingers caught on something sharp and cold.

Jon broke away and looked down, his ragged gasps louder than the winds whistling high above them.

“I was wrong about you,” she said again, looking up at him guilelessly. A splintered arrow pierced her breast.

“Ygritte,” he sobbed, and wrenched the bloody arrow from her chest.

She sank to her knees, the wound steaming in the frigid air. It grew before his eyes and gaped obscenely at him. The hole in her breast was like a magnifying glass. He could see straight through it, but all there was to see was endless gray ice. He flung the splintered wood, and it gleamed like a flashing dagger before it was swallowed up in the empty night.

“I was wrong about you,” she said, blood bubbling from the back of her throat.

Jon turned and walked away. Salt tears froze on his lips.

“Jon!” she called behind him.

His feet slipped and scrabbled, but he didn’t slow his steps. Hadn’t he already died once?

Her voice was growing fainter, caught up and swept away by the wind skirling his cloak, but her words reached him all the same.

When he woke, he was still hard.

Geor Mormont’s raven swooped down from the bedpost opposite him. He landed on Jon’s shoulder in a flutter of dirty black feathers and hopped from one arm to the other. He eyed Jon beadily and squawked right in his ear, “ _SNOW_!”

Jon shoved him off angrily, and the bird took to the bedpost again. “Snow, snow, snow, SNOW!” he cawed, hopping along the frame.

Jon swung his feet off the bed to touch the damp wood floor. He rubbed his crotch irritably and stood up to dress for the day. A heavy pressure settled on his temples and the bridge of his nose. Jon shook his head to clear it, but the day was already sour, his fight already lost.

The sky was lightening into another gray day. Cold gusts of wind snuck through gaps in the cracked door. It was entirely insufficient, like the rest of the Nightfort’s structures. Jon pushed his way through, shoving against heavy snowdrifts on the other side.

His boots sank in snow almost up to his knees as he trudged through the courtyard. Melisandre and her followers gathered around their fires at the fort’s western edge, feeding timber to the flames and reciting their prayers to the Lord of Light.

“R’hlorr remembers his faithful children,” she was saying, her damp and sorry stragglers grouped around her. “The Lord of Light is pleased with your endurance. He will not forget us here, where the dark is gathering! He will not forget our struggles in the fight for the dawn!” Jon felt her bright red gaze on him. Queen Selyse stood at Melisandre’s side, her gloved hands clasped around her shivering daughter’s shoulders. The men who had stayed behind when Stannis marched south were green boys and graybeards. They were out of place here, adrift at the end of the world, with only their priestess to cling to. Jon turned away and stomped into the wet white woods.

The forest was damp and quiet. Jon stopped in a cluster of dripping trees and breathed deeply, his nostrils flaring against the wet winds. He stilled, closed his eyes, and reached instinctively for Ghost.

The wolf was running, running, free and strong and easy. His belly wasn't full, but he would kill again before the sun reached its zenith. Crows took to the skies, cawing angrily as he barreled through the snow, and a family of frightened deer scampered through the trees when his scent approached, but Ghost paid them no mind. Ghost plowed on, sure and purposeful. Ghost belonged.

Jon pulled away, fingernails digging crescents into his palms. He started his slow, plodding walk back through the woods toward the fort. He turned his head, spat in the snow, and felt sour.

The clanging of steel caught his ears as he neared the courtyard. Leathers was at work already, a small crowd blinking and yawning in the morning light. Two opponents circled each other hesitantly.

Satin stepped forward and swung at a boy that Jon recognized as one of his wilding hostages. The boy backed away and threw his sword up in time to deflect Satin’s weak swing. Satin loosened his shoulders, repositioned his helm with one hand and swung again half-heartedly. The wildling boy ducked and skittered away, circling the ring once more while the crowd watched, tired and bored.

Jon moved toward Leathers’ rickety cart of armor and blunted weapons. The wildling master-at-arms was barking epithets at the tepid fighters.

“If your father could see you now, boy,” he snarled at the young wildling, “he’d dig an axe deep in me belly for training such a lily-footed dancer. You’d have to shake me bowels loose to get the weapon free again!” The boy gaped at him, and Satin barreled forward, an indistinct shout ripping from his throat. He plowed the boy into a bank of dripping snow. The two went down, and the crowd cheered almost spiritedly as fists flew. The steel lay at their elbows, forgotten.

Jon shook his head, disgusted, and pulled a blunted greatsword from Leathers’ cart with a scrape of frozen metal. He stalked over to the duo scrabbling in the snow. His foot connected hard with the sinew of Satin’s thigh. His squire squawked in surprise. The two boys rolled off each other and onto their backs, looking up at him.

“Get up,” Jon ordered.

They hurried to their feet, grasping their newly-remembered blades. Jon lifted the greatsword, testing the weight in his gloved hands. It was heavier than he was used to, but it didn't intimidate him as it once might have. With his shoulders tensing under the weapon’s weight, he felt a familiar humming in his veins. His ears opened to the distant buzz of life in the woods surrounding them, the closer thrum of shifting feet and accelerated breaths as the crowd watched, intrigued.

“I'll fit you with armor,” Leathers called out, stepping forward. “I’ve a breastplate and helm that should do.”

“Don’t bother,” Jon said and lifted the weapon with both hands above his head. The two boys shifted their stances defensively, their eyes locked on the blade above them. “These two need no more lessons in defense. There is no defense against fear; there is only attack.” He brought the sword down with an angry whistle, and Satin jumped back. The Oldtown boy lifted his sword, his dark eyes bright in his pale face, two spots of anxiety rising on his cheekbones.

“My lord, will you not wear armor?” Satin coughed nervously. “It doesn't seem wise-”

“Why not?” Jon asked. “Are you the one who'll kill a dead man?” He heaved the greatsword across his body to meet the wildling boy’s sudden parry to his right. The steel clanked angrily, and the boy cried out as his arm flailed under the weight of Jon’s weapon. His own measly shortsword landed with a _splat_ in the wet snow five feet away.

“Pick it up,” Jon said. The boy made to move but stopped abruptly, eyes glued to Jon’s sword. “I’ll only kill you if you don’t do as I say,” Jon warned him. The boy scurried across the ring and swept up his weapon. He turned automatically to place the blade defensively ahead of him.

Jon looked between the two of them, each crouched on either side, already making moves to circle the ring. He leapt forward and jammed his sword hilt into Satin’s wrist. His squire’s weapon tumbled to the snow, and Jon turned away. He approached the wildling boy, the heavy sword cold and gray in his hand. The boy looked nauseated but stood his ground. His eyes reminded Jon of another boy he had once known, a boy who wanted to be Lord of Winterfell but wasn’t allowed to say so.

The boy yelped indignantly when Jon’s hand flashed out to slap him across the cheek. He feinted left, reached out and slapped the boy again. The snap of skin and the boy’s angry yell set his veins aflame, and he laughed, surprised at the strength of his satisfaction.

The boy lifted his blade and whipped downward, landing a stinging blow on Jon’s shin. He heard a crunch behind him and turned to find Satin poised to swing another blow to his legs. Satin stopped when he saw Jon’s face, and Jon jumped in the opening to dart around him. He swung the greatsword against the boy’s back, toppling him to his knees. Jon laughed and lifted the sword above his head with both hands. Maybe he wasn’t entirely alive, but he wasn't dead yet either.

“The Black Bastard of the Wall,” a rasping voice called from the corner of the courtyard. The wildlings turned, muttering, raising their blunted swords when a stranger stepped out of the trees’ gnarled shadows. “Names are just another tool to control the weak, but sometimes you hear one, and think, 'Bugger my corpse, that is well-suited.'”

“What should we call _you_ , then?” Leathers retorted, lifting the axe in his hand menacingly. “Great, ugly bastard?”

He was huge. The man towered a half head above the tallest wildling in the crowd, and his biceps spanned nearly three times’ the width of Jon’s own shoulders. He wore a dented steel breastplate, cold vambraces and well-worn gauntlets. His cloak was gray, nondescript, as was the simple leather hilt of the sword strapped to his waist. Jon could see that its weight and length surpassed his own blunted blade.

“Are you an idiot, wildling?” the man snorted, and a hum went through the crowd as he stepped forward, the lines of his ruined face becoming clear through the morning gloom. “Your fearless leader's taken 'bastard.'" He grinned grotesquely down at them.

“You’re burned,” Jon said without thinking, his eyes on the man’s blistered face. The skin on one side was black. Shiny ripples crawled where flesh had melted and knotted into clumps. His dark hair was tied behind his head, revealing an empty, scabbed hole where another man would have had an ear.

“Yes,” the man agreed, standing outside the ring. He faced Jon directly, his gauntleted hand resting on the sword hilt at his hip. “Have been most my life, boy."

Jon looked at the swirling black ruin of the man’s face and the endless crackling of Melisandre’s fires burned the insides of his ears. “Kissed by fire,” he thought sourly.

“Only a virgin or a zealot would compare the endless hell of flesh burning to a woman’s kiss,” the man rasped, and Jon realized he'd spoken aloud. The man smiled painfully, the skin stretching where his mouth ended in a twisted gap. “I’m no virgin, boy, so I can tell you that the heat between a woman’s legs and a burning pier both can keep you warm at night, but only one'll melt your member off.”

Jon felt his hackles rising, the familiar taste of resentment bubbling up his throat. The man’s face and talk of fire put him on edge. All he could think of was a clear pool surrounded by fresh white snow, and how clean the water had tasted as he lapped it up, flecks damping his snout. The water was all he needed in the world, and he had a whole pool to help himself, and he was free and settled and happy, until the smell of acrid smoke clogged his nose and wrenched him back into a life he didn’t want.

“Did the Fire Priestess send for you?" Jon snarled. “The Burned Man arrives at her call, at the end of the world with the rest of the nobodies. We have no need for lunatics, we have plenty already.”

The man took another step forward, entering the ring. The boys scurried away. Jon lifted the greatsword at the man’s approach, but suddenly it was much too heavy in his hands. He took in the man’s breadth, every bit covered in steel.

“Don’t you know who I am, boy?” the man asked, his hand never leaving his sword hilt’s leather grip.

“I know you,” Jon retorted, a buzzing in his ears. “You’re one of hers: _fire worshipper_ ,” he spat resentfully. “Were you filled with the Lord’s holy light? Were you moved by the power of the one true god to cleanse yourself in his glory? Were you born anew as a man marked by fiery fervor?”

Jon hardly noticed that the wildlings were edging backward, a few shaking their heads. He stood opposite the burned man in the middle of the ring.

“‘Marked by fiery fervor’,” the man repeated, his voice low. “You haven’t taken your eyes off my ugly face since I walked in here, nor have you troubled to hide your revulsion, and you call me _marked_?” He stepped forward and slammed his gauntleted fist down upon Jon’s wrist. Jon’s palm opened automatically, the blade dropping to the snow as Satin’s had. The man clenched Jon’s tunic in a fist at his throat and pulled him upward so that he was staring into the burned man’s burnt face.

“Look again,” the man snarled. “Look where the coals burned clear through my jaw, see? Go on, look at it." He turned his chin and shoved his ruined cheek in Jon's nose. "See those boils from where you're standing, boy? They're from the cloth my mother dressed it with. She didn’t know. It dried out too quick.” Jon couldn’t look away. Half of it was almost normal: a hooked nose that was smooth on one side, gray eyes as dark as his own, a sturdy brow. The gap where his lips no longer met was disconcerting, but the shiny mess of black knots wasn’t so revolting on closer inspection. His eyes travelled up the length of the man’s cheekbone. A ridge ran to his temple, clearly a line where flesh had melted together. Jon swallowed.

“Yes,” the man agreed, calm again, and released his grip on Jon’s tunic. “If you can still accuse me of shoving my own face into a bed of hot coals, you’re a bigger fool than your father.”

Jon looked up at him. “My father is dead,” he said.

“Well, so far I’ve made no bones about you being a genius,” the man snorted.

“I know you,” Jon said. “You came to Winterfell with King Robert. You're Joffrey’s shield.”

“I _was_ Joffrey’s shield, but I had enough, so I left. And then he died. Can’t be sure that’s related, but seems it should be a decent enough recommendation for me.”

“Recommendation?” Jon repeated, vague with surprise. “How have you come to be at the Wall? We've word that the snows have not stopped for weeks just south of here.”

The burned man shrugged, his armor clinking lightly. “I found passage on a ship at Gulltown and sailed to Eastwatch. My courser made better time along the Wall than expected, though I thought to find you at Castle Black.”

“Why were you looking for me?” Jon demanded, and thought briefly of stooping to pick up his sword from the snow. The wildlings were listening intently all around the ring, though Jon knew it was likely because they had nothing better to do.

“I’ve come to serve Ned Stark’s son,” the man said, and threw back his head. His shoulders heaved, and the courtyard rang with his raspy barks of mirth.

Jon’s eyebrows knit together as he looked up at the tall, scarred stranger. The man had spoken his father’s name and laughed, but Jon’s bitterness had trickled away while he was studying the shiny black lines of his ruined face.

“I don’t understand,” Jon said.

The Hound shifted where he stood in the center of the ring, while straggly-haired and scruffy-faced fighters gripped their knives and stared at him avidly. There must have been one hundred wildlings who had risen early to clash steel against each other, an escape from the Nightfort’s cramped arrangements, from the cold, hunger and boredom. They gaped at him, captivated, but the burned man took no more notice of their gawking than a giant might notice a toad. He was tall and broad, grizzled and proud, clad from head to toe in silver steel as cold as the Wall behind them. Standing in the midst of a crowd of wildlings, Jon thought it wasn’t the man who did not belong.

“I’m not sure I can explain it,” he rasped and turned to study the Wall. “I am not the man I was before, but not so different, either.” He shrugged and looked down at Jon with cool gray eyes. “Never in my life have I taken the middle road, boy, but I feel I'm meant to be here.”

“The middle road?” Jon asked.

The Hound rubbed his jaw, clenched and loosened his fists. “This isn't where I want to be, believe that.” He looked around at the damp, blackened Nightfort. More wildlings were beginning to rise, ribald shouts calling out between them, swords clanging together restlessly. He grinned. “But it’s not entirely where I _don’t_ want to be.”

Jon had little time to consider that when a voice broke between them, sweet and mild.

“How lovely to have a visitor; it’s so cold and lonely here.” She stepped around Leathers’ weaponry cart, her red skirts trailing through the snow. Jon sighed inwardly and made to turn away without acknowledging her, but the burned man reeled backward, aghast.

“What are you doing here?” he cried. “I didn’t think to find you here, I _looked_ for you-” he stopped abruptly and blinked at Melisandre. Jon watched him, curious. “I mistook you for another,” the man grunted and shook his head almost dazedly.

“ _I_ did not mistake _you_ ,” Melisandre announced with a smile. “I’ve been waiting for you, Sandor Clegane.”


	6. Alayne III

She found Robert in the stables, hunched over Good Lord Robert and humming as he brushed his fur. The dog was near three and a half stone now, and bowled her cousin over when he sat up and pushed his paws on him. Robert’s giggles abruptly cut off when he heard the crunch of straw and dead leaves beneath her approaching footsteps.

“Who’s that?” he demanded, jumping up, the brush in his hand thrust defensively in front of him. “Alayne!”

“Oh, Robert,” she said, smiling, “it’s only been three days, but I’ve missed you.”

“I haven’t left,” he pouted, turning back to his pup and crossing his arms, “you’ve been ignoring me.”

“I’m sorry, my lord,” she crouched down next to them, “I was afraid Lord Littlefinger would think I was spending too much time with you.” It was the truth, though she had done her best to avoid Littlefinger as well. He would find her, though, and spill little slippery rivulets in her ear, telling her who to speak to and what to say, always couched in sweet, loathsome endearments while he touched her hand or her hair, as innocent as a mouse. Alayne hated mice.

“You look tired,” she observed, noting the purple shadows under his eyes once more.

“He won’t let Good Lord Robert in my room,” her cousin sulked, miserable. “I can’t sleep without him! And Good Lord Robert, he missed me too, he hates it here in these dirty, stinky stables.” The dog licked his master’s cheek, then circled once and settled down comfortably in the straw. Alayne thought the dog was quite taken with Robert, but also probably quite snug in the stinky stables.

“The lords will be arriving tomorrow,” she told him. “You must sleep tonight, so they can see how strong and healthy you are.”

“I don’t care about them! I don’t want them here. I don’t want to see them, or talk to them!”

“Is that something a great lord would say, Robert?”

He dug a stick in the dirt beneath the straw, digging and digging a shallow little grave.

“Alayne,” he said finally, “are all lords like Lord Littlefinger?”

She sighed and brushed her hand over the top of his head. “No, sweetling, not all of them. But some are, and they ruin the world for the rest of us.”

“I hate him,” he declared quietly, “he didn’t love my mother, not like I did, and he wants to take Good Lord Robert away from me, I know it.”

“I hate him too,” she said. She paused a moment and listened intently, but all she heard were horses moving heavily in their stalls, the swish of tails a light sigh in the background. Leaning forward, she whispered, “Robert, I must tell you something. Do you remember when I told you that he wasn’t my father, but you were still my cousin?” He looked up at her and nodded. “It’s true, my lord. My mother was your lady mother’s sister.”

“My mother’s sister? You mean Lady Catelyn?” he asked her, tired eyes wide. “So you’re... you’re Sansa!” he exclaimed, and she shushed him quickly. “But I thought Sansa had red hair?” he asked, gazing at the dull brown waves around her shoulders.

“She did,” she grinned mischievously, “and she will again.”

He returned her smile automatically, though he was still confused.

“I believe that Littlefinger is going to make me marry again,” she said, “and I don’t want to. I don’t want to because I would have to leave you, and I would never go home again, not truly, and because I am tired of always doing what other people tell me to do! And- and because I think, deep down, Littlefinger wants me to marry _him_ , and he’ll do whatever he can to make me his wife in the end.”

“You can’t!” Robert was distressed, and Sansa motioned hurriedly at him to lower his voice again. “You can’t leave me,” he whispered, “and you can’t marry him! He’s mean, and- and old!”

“Robert,” she giggled in spite of herself, “just because someone is old doesn’t mean they can’t be a good friend, or a good partner. But you’re right about Littlefinger, I can’t marry him. So I have to leave now. Soon.”

“You’re leaving? You’re leaving me?” Robert looked ready break down, and so young and tired.

“Come with me,” she whispered urgently. “You and Good Lord Robert. Maester Colemon will go too, as long as you come with me.”

“Where?” he asked.

“Winterfell,” she said. “Home.”

He blinked. “When?”

“A few days. I’m not sure exactly. But Robert, it’s very important that these lords and ladies meet you before we leave, and they see how strong and handsome and lively you are. You must greet them each as they arrive, outside would be best. You can show them what you have taught Good Lord Robert.”

“Why?” he demanded, not quite petulantly.

“Because,” she told him, “you will come back and be Lord of the Eyrie when you are grown. They are good people, most of them, my lord, and they work hard, they watch over their people and their lands, and they want what is best for the Vale, and they want to love you and to look forward to your good counsel when you are older. You are their falcon, and they must remember the sweet, spirited boy that you were while I teach you to become the great lord you will be.”

“I like falcons,” Robert agreed, “but I like dogs better,” and he looked fondly down at Good Lord Robert.

Sansa wasn’t quite sure why her heart beat a little faster at that.

“So you will come with me when I tell you?” she asked him. “And keep everything we’ve just said a secret until then? And greet the lords and ladies when they arrive?”

“Yes,” he said simply. “What about my things? And Good Lord Robert’s toys?”

“Pick out a toy, and keep his leash with you. Maester Colemon and I have already packed your things. I made you something,” she said with a smile. “I hid it under your blankets. Put it on when it’s time to leave.”

He nodded and bounced nervously on his toes. She grabbed his hand and threaded their fingers together. “Come, my lord,” she said, pulling him out the stable doors, “shall we have something to eat?”

They walked out, blinking in the bright afternoon sunlight, Good Lord Robert at their heels. There was more activity going on than she had expected, a flurry of servants sweeping the steps, taking down and folding damp laundry, hurriedly ushering chickens back to their coops. She stopped a boy passing on his way to the stables and asked what the fuss was about.

“The lords,” he told her, “A group of ‘em come early, m’lady.”

It was Lord Lyonel Corbray, his brother Ser Lyn, Myranda’s father Ser Nestor, now Lord of the Gates, and his brother, Bronze Yohn Royce. Alayne thought it a very strange group indeed, and Bronze Yohn for his part did not look happy about it. Lord Corbray led five hundred men-at-arms, and Bronze Yohn near a thousand, though it appeared to Alayne that at least two hundred of them were Gates of the Moon men returning home with Lord Nestor. The men-at-arms pulled up at the fields where Good Lord Robert ran after the flocks and began making camp. The lords Corbray and the lords Royce rode on with twenty men behind them to the courtyard where she and Robert were standing. She gave his hand a quick, tight squeeze and let go. He took a deep breath and stepped forward.

“My lords, welcome!” Robert called out, his voice tinny above the gentle winds whistling through the keep, “We are glad to receive you here at the Gates of the Moon!”

Lyn Corbray did not dismount his horse but wheeled around to face them, looking down at Robert from above. Alayne felt suddenly uneasy when she remembered the last time Ser Lyn had attended a council with Littlefinger, but Lord Lyonel jumped down and swept a gracious bow, while Nestor Royce reined up and dismounted more deliberately.

“Lord Robert?” he asked, examining him, “Is that you? Why, you’ve grown half a foot since I saw you last! Gained some weight, too, have you? Come now, let’s see your muscle,” and Robert giggled as Lord Nestor took his arm and flexed it back and forth.

“Congratulations on your recent marriage, Lord Lyonel,” Alayne said demurely with a graceful little curtsey. “I’ve heard only how sweet and lovely your new bride is,” _nothing about how her father is a merchant and her dowry a fortune, oh no_ , “but she must be dreadfully miserable without her lord husband just now, at the height of your newly-wedded bliss. You are quite wise to leave her wanting, for I’m certain she spends her days sighing over your departure and her nights dreaming of your return.”

Lord Lyonel snorted at that, but Alayne could tell he was pleased by the thought. She smiled brightly at him, the wind blowing strands of hair across her cheek. He returned her smile in delightfully good humor. “Alayne Stone,” he said, “I see you are just as your father described, with wits besides. And who is this?” he demanded with jollity as Good Lord Robert sniffed at his legs. The dog jumped up to place his paws on Lord Corbray’s thighs when the man turned his attention to him.

“That is Good Lord Robert,” Robert said proudly, “Alayne gave him to me. Good Lord Robert, come!” The dog turned his head to look at Robert over his shoulder, then went back to sniffing Lord Corbray’s boots, giving them a quick, cautious lick. Robert called him again, and this time he trotted over to his master and sat at his feet, waiting.

“Lay down,” Robert commanded him, and the pup laid down but almost immediately jumped up again. “Good Lord Robert, _lay down_ ,” he said warningly, and the dog laid down reluctantly, staring up at him with deep brown eyes. “Good boy. Roll over!” Good Lord Robert rolled in a quick, jerky motion as if he did not like being without the ground underneath his paws. Bronze Yohn had dismounted now as well, the old man’s face as stern as a stone, his bright blue eyes regarding the two Roberts thoughtfully, his armor gleaming in the sun. He removed thick fur gloves, his breath steaming the air before him, and Alayne thought she glimpsed the flicker of a smile beneath his thick white beard.

Robert picked up a stick and held it high above his head. “Jump, Good Lord Robert! Jump!” The little dog bounced, sat, bounced, sat and bounced again, like a silly, wriggling jumping bean. Alayne laughed, a long, joyful trill breaking from deep within her, and she felt the lords’ eyes on her. Lord Corbray laughed then, and Lord Nestor, and even Bronze Yohn smirked, his eyes sparkling.

“Father!” they heard then, “Uncle!” They turned and saw Lady Myranda hurrying toward them, her hair tied messily on top of her head, hands wiping quickly at her woolen dress. Her father embraced her with a wide happy smile, and she kissed her uncle on the cheek quickly. “You’re a day early, my lord,” she said reproachfully, “so don’t dare harass me about your supper, you hear?” She pinned her uncle with a glare, and he held up his hands in surrender.

“Feed me a horse’s arse, for all I care, Myranda, just ply me with thick, dark ale first.” Myranda leaned in the direction of the stable and called for hands to tend the party’s mounts, but Lyn Corbray dismounted and led his own horse in with the stable boys. Alayne forced herself to look away, a sudden disquietude souring her mood.

“Come in, come in, my lords,” Myranda called, curtseying quickly to the twenty or so sworn shields, squires and servants who had accompanied them up to the courtyard, “we have wine and sweet mead inside, and soup on the kettle with bread baking besides. He’s waiting for you,” she added as an aside to her father and his brother. Alayne stepped back and pulled Robert with her, squeezing his shoulder briefly as they watched the men enter the keep. Her eyes swept over the little crowd, and she smiled at all who looked her way.

“They’ve brought a Septon,” she said suddenly, narrowing her eyes at the small man in gray robes trimmed in orange, the seven-pointed star of the faith embroidered on his chest. He clutched a brown leather bag with yellow scrolls poking out and trailed near the back of the group, waiting patiently on the stone steps outside the door.

“Septon!” she called, and he turned. She stepped closer and tipped her head courteously. “Welcome to the Gates of the Moon, good Septon. You are from Runestone?” she questioned, looking at the gray and orange coloring of his attire.

“Indeed, my child,” he responded, bowing at her and Lord Robert in turn. “I serve the Seven for Lord Royce and the good men and women of Runestone. Lord Royce asked me to join him here, at his brother’s insistence.”

 _Why?_ she wondered. “You are most welcome,” she said again, “I pray your business goes smoothly for you. Please feel you may approach Lady Myranda or myself for anything you might need while you are here, Septon.”

“I thank you sincerely,” he said, “though I myself am not sure what purpose I’m here to serve. I had thought there was to be a wedding, but I’ve heard no further mention of it since departing Runestone six days ago.” She nodded, a chill spreading from her heart, and followed him inside.

Lady Myranda had led the others into the dining hall, while Bronze Yohn, Lord Nestor, and Lyonel Corbray stood in the entryway with Lord Baelish. “Shall we adjourn to the solar, my lords,” he was saying. “Alayne will serve the wine, and we have much to discuss on recent movements in Dorne and King’s Landing.” His cool brown eyes slid over her face to the door behind her. Ser Lyn came trotting in, and at his sudden movement Good Lord Robert nipped at his heels excitedly. He jumped again on Lord Lyonel, leaving muddy pawprints on his cloak.

“Please, my lords,” Littlefinger gestured to the stairs, “I’ll be right behind you.” The four men started up, and he turned to her cousin, eyes flashing.

“Get that damn dog outside,” he hissed at Robert, “and I swear to the Seven, if he comes inside again, I will banish him to the bloody fields with those damn sheep you love so much. Come, Alayne.” He started up the stairs. Alayne followed close behind, but she turned to look at her cousin over her shoulder and winked. Robert grinned, turned, and skipped out the doors, Good Lord Robert bounding alongside him.

The remaining lords and ladies arrived the next day. Fat Lord Belmore was the first to arrive, with five hundred men behind him. His brother Ser Marwyn rode out at break of dawn to meet them on the road, and they arrived at the Gates well past noon. Lord Belmore was resplendent in a purple velvet riding cloak, six large silver bells adorning the fabric at his back, gold rings at his fingers and a hammered silver collar around his neck, hidden somewhat beneath his many chins. Robert was waiting by the stables to greet them when they rode forward, having spent the morning chasing Good Lord Robert in the shepherd’s fields, threading about the Royce and Corbray soldiers. Lord Belmore stopped short at the sight of his dusty and sweaty liege, the dog’s leash firmly in Robert’s hand, though he strained at the end of his rope to sniff eagerly at the new arrivals. Lord Belmore waited for two men to come up and help him heavily dismount his horse, then nodded awkwardly at Lord Robert, unsure what to make of him and unwilling to step closer to the exuberant pup.

Ser Symond Templeton and Lord Gerold Grafton rode in shortly after, their parties having met on the trip westward two days past. They led near eight hundred swords, though it looked to Alayne that the great majority of them were Templeton men. She wondered why Lord Grafton had not roused more Gulltown swords and what that meant for her lord father. Alayne curtseyed and smiled brilliantly at the Knight of Ninestars, who looked as though he had been struck by a lance to the temple at the sight of her. Lord Robert and Good Lord Robert performed the same show as the day before, though Lord Grafton seemed bored and Ser Templeton watched Alayne more than her cousin.

“Lord Grafton,” she said, “I have heard that Gulltown has fared remarkably well considering the war at your doorstep.”

“True enough, child,” he responded, “I expect I’ll have several more ‘friends’ with begging bowls in hand before this winter is over.”

“It must be gratifying, my lord, to bestow aid upon your neighbors when you are well and they are not.”

Lord Gerold regarded her for a moment, eyes sweeping over her face and down her body. He was a man of middling age and build, light brown hair shocked with white at his temples, a scratchy brown beard covering his lip and jaws. Alayne realized with a sudden unpleasant shock that in build, age, appearance and expression, he reminded her of none so much as Lord Petyr Baelish.

“Power is gratifying,” he agreed, and swept inside without so much as another glance at Lord Robert. Ser Templeton hovered a bit longer, appearing as if he wished to stay outside with them, but Alayne smiled and urged him sweetly to meet with the other lords.

It was almost evening by the time Lady Waynwood arrived, though her seat was the closest in proximity to the Gates of the Moon. Her retinue was as large as the Runestone party, and they rode up in stately grandeur, green and black banners snapping proudly in the wind. Anya Waynwood was a tall, old woman with sharp grey eyes and greyer hair, her straight back stitched tightly into a thick, green bodice, her soft fur riding cloak black trimmed in green. The sigil of House Waynwood was not stitched on the back, but was mounted instead in two halves on either side where the cloak joined in front to cover its wearer, a green shield with a broken black wheel, breaking again and again every time Lady Waynwood moved her arms.

She rode into the courtyard with near thirty men and women, a young man and teenage boy to her right bearing the sigil of House Waynwood, and riding to her left, a tall, strapping buck with long, sandy hair, deep blue eyes and a strong jaw, clad in light steel armor, a red-and-white checked shield adorned on his leather jerkin above his right breast.

 _Harry the Heir_ , Alayne thought, noting his full lips and the wide breadth of his shoulders. She felt a hot blush sweep over her breasts and rise high in her cheeks.

“My Lady Waynwood,” Robert was saying gallantly, “I am most delighted to see you again! Welcome! What a beautiful horse, and such a lovely cloak! Would you like to meet Good Lord Robert? He’s been mine for three months now, Alayne gave him to me. I’ve taught him a few tricks, I’ll have to show you. Let me help you down!” Lady Waynwood dismounted with little trouble, though she gave her hand to Lord Robert courteously enough, looking quite bemused. When they were both firmly on the ground, Robert swept a gracious bow with such flourish that Alayne had to hide her smirk behind her hand.

“It is good to see you outdoors, my lord,” Lady Waynwood said kindly, “and so handsome, with some wind in your cheeks! Oh!” Good Lord Robert had reared up and placed his paws on her chest, licking her face enthusiastically. Alayne stepped forward at once, but Robert pulled him off almost immediately and began apologizing with such heart-felt earnestness that Lady Waynwood laughed good-naturedly, wiping slobber from her cheek, and begged him to show her one of their tricks. They watched happily for a time, while Alayne stole glances at her nephew. He caught her eye at one point, a tiny smile curling the edges of his mouth. She felt the blush creep up her face again, so she cracked a large smile and held his gaze for a moment, hoping to appear more self-assured than she felt.

“My lady,” Robert said cordially, making Good Lord Robert sit at his side, “it is my pleasure to present to you again my _cousin_ , Lady Alayne,” he smiled at her, “who gave me Good Lord Robert as a gift and has been attending all my lessons with me and helping me see to my chores. She has been a great friend to me, since we both know how it feels to lose our mothers...” Robert’s eyes flicked downward at that, his mood quickly deflating.

“Lady Alayne,” Anya Waynwood said, tipping her head gravely, though they both knew Alayne was no lady, “Lord Robert, you know my son Donnel, the Knight of the Gate, and this is Wallace, my youngest boy,” both men stepped forward to grip Lord Robert’s hand, “and my nephew, Ser Harrold Hardyng.” Harry the Heir knelt at Lord Robert’s feet, tossing his cloak behind him.

“My lord, it is a great delight to meet you at last,” Ser Harrold said with a cocky smile, before turning his eyes back to Alayne. “My lady.”

Good Lord Robert sniffed at his face, but Robert kept him firmly out of licking range. “I have been told you won the melee at Runestone, Ser Harrold,” Robert said. “Are you a very good swordsman, then?”

“Very good, my lord,” Harry rose and nonchalantly flicked a strand of hair off his forehead. “Our master-at-arms at Ironoaks needs a second every time he stands against me.”

“I was never taught much about swordplay,” Robert said a bit sadly. “My father was a good soldier when he was young, but my mother always said I would have time to learn when I was older and stronger... and now, my cousin Alayne takes charge of my studies, but she’s a girl and she doesn’t know the first _thing_ about sword fighting!”

“Lord Robert!” she exclaimed, outraged even though it was true, but Harry the Heir threw back his golden-haired head and laughed.

“I should think not, my lord,” he smirked, “you are lucky to have a beautiful girl take such care in your instruction, but I am sure there are limits to her interest in a boy’s education.” He smiled back at his aunt. “Not that a girl cannot learn a bit of swordplay, ask Lady Waynwood if you disagree. Anyone can learn the basics, and everyone should.” His eyes moved to Alayne again, a tiny question on his face.

“I do not even know how to hold a sword,” she admitted. “My... my father did not think it would be something I should ever need know.”

“Come, Lord Robert,” Harrold said, eyes still holding Alayne’s, “Would you like a short practice round, here at the Gates, before I shed my armor? And afterward, we can show your cousin what you have learned, and perhaps even teach her how to hold a sword.”

“Oh, yes!” Robert jumped, Good Lord Robert taking his cue and jumping as well. “May I, Alayne? It’s been ages since anyone took me to the training yard!”

“Of course, Lord Robert,” Alayne said quickly, seeing Lady Waynwood’s head turn in surprise, “you are the lord here, after all, you mustn’t seek my permission. I... I’m afraid I will have to join you and Ser Harry some other time, though; I must find Lady Myranda, to help prepare the feast.”

She ushered Lady Waynwood and her party inside, while Lord Robert led Ser Harry excitedly across the courtyard, Good Lord Robert running ahead of them. Alayne showed the Waynwood retinue their rooms, served wine and bread, ordered a bath brought up for Lady Waynwood, and once she was sure they were properly settling in, ran up the stairs to Maester Colemon’s solar. She felt a bit guilty for leaving all the work to Myranda, and for waiting all day with Lord Robert to greet the lords as they arrived instead of helping prepare for the evening’s festivities, but Myranda was Lady of the Gates, after all, not Alayne. _I have my own home to be lady of,_ she thought.

Maester Colemon looked at her solemnly when she entered and wordlessly held out a scroll. It was still cold and damp when she grasped it. She broke light green wax with shaking fingers and unfurled the parchment. Alayne read the words twice, and then once more, committing the particulars to memory before dropping it into the fire flickering in the hearth. She watched the paper curl and burst, a pile of ashes in five quick seconds, before turning to the maester.

“Tomorrow,” she told him.

“Tomorrow,” he nodded.

She twisted her fingers together nervously, a cold pit of fear in her stomach. “The timing is too soon.”

“The timing,” he told her, “is too good to be true.”

She wondered about that.

“Maester,” she said, “there is something I would do, but I do not want to do it. I would rather listen to Littlefinger and Gerold Grafton argue for hours over who was wealthier before I would do what I need to do.” She sighed. “Will you come with me, now? I could use your support.”

When she explained her purpose inside his modest room three doors down from Bronze Yohn’s chambers, the septon stared at her in shock.

“My- my lady,” he stammered, “this is highly unusual, and I am not sure I understand-”

“My circumstances are highly unusual, good septon, but I would use what advantages I still have.”

He blinked at her, confused. “I am not the High Septon, my child. I know you understand this, but I feel I must point out that I have no power over statutes, and my word does not matter under the law or in the eyes of gods or men.”

She remembered Littlefinger’s satisfied smirk when he recounted for her Cersei’s Walk of Punishment. “It matters,” she told him, “in the eyes of men.”

He nodded slowly, and Alayne moved to settle herself on his neatly made bed of straw. She felt suddenly very frightened and very, very young.

“You will stay, won’t you, Maester Colemon?” she asked when she saw a movement by the door in her periphery. She felt a thousand tiny pinpricks in her eyes and blinked rapidly. He looked at her for a moment, then nodded and turned to face the wall.

Alayne took a number of deep breaths and wrapped her arms around herself. She leaned back, closing her eyes, and tried not to tremble as the septon washed his hands.

Back in her chambers, she thought again of the contents of the letter she had received, and pushed her visit to the septon’s room out of mind.

 _Tomorrow_ , she mused. Tomorrow. But first, she must make it through tonight.

She flung open the doors of her dresser and stood for a moment, staring at the rows of neatly hung silks and linens. _I’ve never once worn any of these_ , she realized, _not since we descended the Eyrie_. Her warm wool and cotton dresses were folded in stacks in the chest at the foot of her bed. The thought of opening that chest to look at squares of dull brown cloth suddenly filled her with bile. She yanked out the red and blue confection that had reminded Littlefinger of her mother and pulled it on without thinking.

When she stood in front of the mirror, she didn’t recognize herself. _Good_ , she thought savagely, a strange buzzing in her ears. She opened her jewelry box to find a jumble of silver chains and ruby studs mixed in a tangled ball, and the mess suddenly enraged her. She flung it across the room, the silver links and precious jewels skittering on the hardwood floor. She turned back to the looking glass and moved to pin her dull brown hair behind her head, but no sooner had she picked up her brush than she slammed it back on the desk, the mirror wobbling precariously in front of her.

 _I am sick of lies_ , she thought angrily, _and I am sick of this stupid, miserable game_.

But if it _was_ just a game, all of it, the introductions, the politics, the endless, driveling niceties, just a game with her life as the wager, what choice did she have?

 _“A pretty little talking bird,”_ she heard then, and squeezed her eyes shut, _“repeating all the pretty little words they taught you to recite.”_

She looked at her reflection, an angry, sullen face glaring out from behind bright blue eyes and soft white skin.

“I’m not a bird,” she said defiantly, “and not a lion either. I’ll be a wolf again tonight.”

Alayne was the last to enter the dining hall, and saw that the wine and ale had been flowing freely for an hour or so at least. Nestor Royce and Donnel Waynwood were arguing in good spirits at the high table, horns of ale clasped in their hands, a dripping tankard between them. Lady Waynwood had two red spots high in her cheeks and was nodding along to the musicians playing _A Thousand Eyes, and One_ in the corner. Lord Robert, without the dog for once, was practically clinging to Harrold Hardying’s arm, and shouting to anyone who would listen how he could now cut down an approaching attacker, as long as he was near the same height (which was just about four feet). The young knight was taking it all in stride, Alayne noticed, sweeping his hair behind his head and laughing good-naturedly as he lifted his young liege so that her cousin was swinging from his large, muscled arm, Robert’s legs kicking frantically back and forth as he laughed.

Alayne watched them for a moment. Harry the Heir had lost his bulky armor, and his heavy red tunic stretched tight over broad shoulders, his leather breeches tucked in sturdy black boots. Her eyes swept over his form, lingering on the corded muscles moving beneath his tunic as he hoisted her cousin up and down, the small apple bobbing in his neck when he laughed, the masculine set of his jaw, and she pressed her thighs together irritably against the unpleasant sting between her legs. She turned quickly to the serving girl passing to her left, snaking out a hand to clasp her wrist.

“A cup of wine, if you please,” she said. She downed the first fill in one long go, though the wine was a thick, sour red, and held her cup out for another serving. “Thank you,” she said and took a deep breath, ready to face the crowd.

She had shared a few jabs with Lord Lyonel regarding his young bride, asked Lady Waynwood about harvest conditions at Ironoaks, and was considering approaching Bronze Yohn about inviting the Faith to court when Littlefinger found her.

“You’re wearing that dress,” he said, leaning in close to brush his hand over her back, pushing her lightly so her thighs pressed against the high table. “I thought I told you that dress makes you look like your mother.” She could see purple lines in between his straight white teeth.

“You told me that men see what they want to see, father,” she shrugged negligently. “They all know me, why should they see anything else?” She locked his eyes in hers and leaned in, exposing the long white expanse of skin between her jaw and the line of her dress, and pursed her lips in a pout, blinking petulantly. “And I like these colors on myself. Should I not be beautiful tonight, for once?”

His eyes lingered on her skin, and she saw a gleam of something frightening as he sucked his lips briefly to his teeth. The pressure at her back increased, and she almost lost her balance, before he abruptly let go and moved his hand to her shoulder, twisting the hair there loosely in his fingers.

“Of course, my dear,” he said, blinking, “you should wear the finest silks and jewels, whatever you desire, but you are always beautiful, no matter your dress.”

Alayne wondered how men could be such fools sometimes. She knew men looked at her and liked what they saw, she knew what went on in the marriage bed and that men revered it, she even knew that men would look at her and imagine her naked, but still she could not understand what the fuss was about. Everyone knew what the naked body looked like, male and female, and half the world had women’s parts, so why did men let themselves turn into such blathering fools over a bit of exposed neck? She remembered Harrold Hardyng’s thick, sculpted shoulders and the long, straight line of his collarbone beneath his tunic, and wondered if that might have something to do with it.

The meal was served and enjoyed quickly, the night rapidly devolving as the party grew louder. The musicians eventually gave up and left to drink their own wine outside. Alayne indulged Ser Templeton’s well-meaning but muddled conversation for a while before being drawn into an argument with Ser Grafton over tariffs for local exports. She felt she presented her argument reasonably well, but had partaken so much wine she could not truly take the discussion seriously, and left to chat about the state of Strongsong, the seat of House Belmore, with Lord Benedar. They spoke merrily enough, and Alayne laughed quite a bit, Lord Benedar’s chins wobbling with his chuckles as his eyes roamed her face and occasionally lower.

“Alayne, Alayne!” Little Robert skipped up to her, smiling brightly. “The musicians have all gone, you must sing for us now!”

“Robert...” she started warningly, but he grabbed her hand and pulled her up.

“Yes, you’re such a lovely singer, and you know it too, so don’t make a fuss, we all want to hear you sing!” Lady Waynwood called out her agreement, Ser Templeton requested _Two Hearts that Beat as One_ , a flush rising in his cheeks, and Alayne knew she had lost.

Someone handed her a lute, so she strummed a few chords, blinking away the periodic sway the warm room around her was taking, and began to sing the Knight of Ninestar’s request.

They listened for a bit, but most were too far gone to follow even the first song, and before long, the crowd began to disperse as lords begged their leave and went to bed. _I am singing them to sleep_ , Alayne thought, amused.

She was near the end of the _The Maids that Bloom in Spring_ when Lord Littlefinger left with Ser Grafton, Ser Lyn, and Lord Lyonel as she watched. _Not Lord Corbray_ , she thought with disappointment, but Lady Waynwood was still present, sipping from her wine cup and swaying slightly in rhythm with the music, and Bronze Yohn Royce was seated a few chairs down, gnawing at a nearly stripped lamb bone.

Alayne finished the ballad, and strummed a few chords as she waited for Littlefinger to have made it far away from the dining hall before starting her last song, one she had written herself.

 

_The Northman came South for a summer,_

_The Northman came South for a day,_

_The Northman came South for his hand and his King,_

_But the South came and swept him away._  

 

Lady Waynwood was watching her, the cup of wine in her hand pausing mid-air.

 

_His children he brought them together,_

_He told them be prudent and wise,_

_He told them be caring and strong as a wolf,_

_But the lions were stags in disguise._

 

Lord Robert's head was drooping almost to rest on Ser Harrold's arm, who beamed at Alayne, oblivious.

 

_To his sons he left words of honor,_

_To his wife he left a cold bed,_

_His daughters he left in the grip of their foes,_

_When the South did not leave him his head._

 

Lord Royce looked up and blinked.

 

_The wedding bell tolled and they knew that_

_Alone each must walk to go forth,_

_But they promised the debt would one day be repaid,_

_When the wolves run again in the North._

 

When she finished, the hall was almost quiet. There was a quick smattering of applause from Ser Harrold, Ser Templeton and a few Runestone knights who were bravely battling on through the evening, but Lord Royce and Lady Waynwood were silent, disturbed. Alayne curtseyed graciously and begged her leave to go to bed.

She fell asleep quickly, the wine dragging her under, and she dreamt of her wedding night for the first time in a long while, and a night when green flames licked the sky outside her bedroom window.

The morning dawned bright and cold. Duana arrived to help her dress, but Alayne brushed her off, asking for a small basin to wash from.

“Would you tell Lord Robert I would like to see him here, if he please?” she asked after the girl had delivered the bucket and was preparing to leave. “And thank you, but I will not be needing you again this morning.” Duana nodded and closed the door behind her.

Alayne turned to the basin and examined the small tube she had asked Maester Colemon to procure for her. She sucked in a breath and dunked her head under water.

It took nearly an hour and a half, but when she looked at her reflection in the mirror, she was satisfied with the effect, twirling a russet-colored curl around her finger. The dye was a few shades brighter than her natural hue, and the deep red waves cascading down her shoulders had a fiery glow with the sun at her back.

An excited knocking at the door made her jump. She crept over and stood close behind it.

“Robert?” she whispered. “Is that you?”

“Yes!” came her cousin’s voice on the other side, “Duana said you wanted to see me, Alayne, but you’ve locked the door!”

She quickly undid the latch and opened the door carefully so that she remained hidden from any who might be passing in the hall.

“Alayne?” her cousin was peering around the room, bewildered. When she closed the door with a quick snap, he turned and saw her, eyes going wide.

He looked at her for a second or two with his mouth agape, his gaze traveling over the bright red locks. “I like it,” he said decisively.

“Do you?” she asked with a smile. “I like it too.”

“Yes,” he said slowly, “it... it reminds me of my mother.”

“Me too,” she replied, though she did not indicate that she meant of _her_ mother.

“Did you do it to show the lords, Alayne?” he asked.

“Not Alayne anymore, Robert. I’ll be Sansa now, again.” She pulled him close and looked down seriously into his eyes. “I don’t have much time, but- it’s today, Robert. We’re leaving today.”

He gazed up at her, and she saw fear flickering in his eyes. “When?” he asked.

“Soon. This afternoon. You have your present I made you?” He nodded. “Good. Keep it with you, but hidden, along with Good Lord Robert’s toy and his leash. Stay outside, close to the stables. When you hear the horn, put it on and wait for me.”

He swallowed hard and bit the inside of his cheek. “What if you don’t come? What if something goes wrong?”

“Stay with Maester Colemon, whatever happens to me. He is on your side.” She smiled at him then, a great nervous excitement building in her chest. “But nothing is going to go wrong. We can do this, Robert,” she said. “We can go home, together.”

He clasped her hand in both of his and brought it up to the side of his face. “Together,” he whispered.

“I love you, Robert. Go on now, I must finish dressing for the Council.”

After he left, Sansa knelt at the foot of her bed and pulled out the chest where she had been storing her needlework. She shook out and donned the white dress that had taken her nearly six weeks to perfect. It was chiffon and satin, so delicate it was nearly indecent, but while it clung to her lines and curves, its neckline was modest. She tied a silver sash at her waist and pulled out a long, thin silver ribbon to tie back her hair.

 _I ought to give this to Ser Harry to tie around his sword_ , the strange thought popped in her head. The sudden image of Harry the Heir fighting in a melee to win back her home, her favor tied around his sword, was so absurd and sickeningly sweet it made her laugh, harsh and sharp. _As if Winterfell could be won in a melee_.

The Council met in the great hall an hour before noon. Sansa knew the lords would be late in arriving due to the revelries of the evening prior, so she tried to time her entrance accordingly. She reached the foyer, her heels clicking on stone steps, and felt an icy splash when she saw Littlefinger waiting in the doorway. _I should go back_ , she thought, _this was a mistake!_

It was too late, though, he had turned at the sound of her footsteps. The chill in her stomach intensified when his eyes swept over her, face turning hard. He stepped closer, and she forced herself to lift her chin and walk toward the door.

“What are you doing?” he hissed. “You’re not invited at this Council, and why in seven _hells_  do you look like that?”

“I dyed my hair,” she said simply, “and put on a white dress.”

“I can see that,” he grabbed her arm, “and I see what you think to do, but it’s too soon, sweetling, we haven’t even finalized the betrothal yet.”

“I don’t think it’s too soon,” she said. “I think it’s just the right time.”

“And how would you know?” He tightened his grip on her arm. “I’ve saved you and kept you safe until now, haven’t I? Why do you want to ruin everything I’ve built for you?”

She yanked her arm away with as much force as she could muster. “I may be just a pawn in this game, _father_ ,” she said, “but I’ll not be _your_ pawn any longer.” And before he could stop her, she strode into the hall.

The Knight of Ninestars noticed her immediately and sat up straight in his chair, his mouth open. His eyes followed her as she walked toward the table, but the other lords and ladies were talking quietly amongst themselves, and most did not look up until she was halfway around the long row, the click of her heels echoing slightly in the large, drafty room. Myranda Royce hurried up to her and caught her arm just before she reached the end of the table.

“What has gotten into you, Alayne?” she whispered in her ear. “Did you come to serve? We have no need of you today, though you certainly didn’t dress for serving, did you?” Sansa smirked at that, but Myranda continued. “You cannot be here, Alayne, this is a Council for the _lords_ and _ladies_ of the Vale!”

“You’ve been so kind to me, Myranda,” Sansa told her. “I will not forget the help you’ve given me and Lord Robert.” And she slipped her arm out of Myranda’s grasp and stepped up to the head of the long table where the Council of the Vale had gathered.

“My lords and ladies,” she called, and their faces turned to her in surprise. “Lord Littlefinger has called this Council to demonstrate for you all of the good deeds he has done for the betterment of the Vale in his year as Lord Protector.” He had entered the great hall and stood now opposite her at the foot of the table, his hands clenched in fists, his face still as stone. “He has brokered a few marriages- much to the delight of Lord Lyonel’s wife!- built a few alliances between Houses, tore some more down, and shifted a few debts around. But dare not call your Lord Protector _lazy_! His crown jewel of maneuverings is to be revealed today: a marriage between Ser Harrold Hardying, the handsome young Falcon of the Vale, and of course, Heir to the East, to Lord Petyr Baelish’s own bastard daughter!”

She smiled at Harry the Heir, who was looking up at her in consternation, his strong jaw clenched tight, brow wrinkled in displeasure. The Council had broken out into a myriad of angry voices, and Bronze Yohn looked as though he were going to stand and shout for order.

“But I say,” she continued quickly, and the agitated buzzing died away, “the present strength of the Vale is a testament to the strength of its _Council_. You had ruled yourselves for three years before Lady Lysa remarried, and how many years before that, while Lord Jon Arryn acted as Hand in King’s Landing? What does the Vale need a Lord Protector for anymore? To broker marriages and displace debts? And why would the Council support a marriage between its strong and lusty heir to a baseborn girl whose father was born Lord of Salt and Rocks?”

Sansa thought Littlefinger would finally cut her off, but Ser Gerold Grafton spoke up first.

“And what would you know about the affairs of running a kingdom, child?” he sneered. “You’ve changed the color of your hair, and suddenly you’re no longer a bastard girl in the company of her betters?”

“I know much of running a kingdom, Lord Gerold,” she replied, “and I know this: when spring approaches again, the Vale will be the strongest kingdom in Westeros, and the East’s judgments will be nigh on unbreakable.”

Bronze Yohn lumbered to his feet at that point and placed his hands on the table, leaning in her direction, speaking slowly and deliberately. “When spring comes again, the Vale will be strong... but winter is coming, is that right, Alayne Stone?”

She nodded slowly, a gradual thrill of recognition running though the Council gathered around the long table. “Winter is coming, Lord Royce,” she agreed, “but I am Lady Sansa, of Houses Stark and Lannister.”

The babble echoed off stone walls and through the great hall, and Sansa allowed her eyes to settle on Littlefinger, still standing at the other end of the table. They stared at each other for a long moment, but Sansa could no more read what he was thinking than a book slammed shut.

“My lords and ladies,” she called out again, “I am sorry to have deceived you. Lord Baelish offered me an escape from King’s Landing where I was a prisoner in the bed of my enemies. I have often been very confused as to where to place my trust, ever since my betrothed promised my father mercy and cut his head off while I watched. But in the lords and ladies of the Vale, I see true heroes come again, and a land of such beauty and strength, it must come from a story! And just as in the stories, the villain comes to take what isn’t his, with no regard for health, or lands, or justice!” She pointed at Littlefinger then, one long arm reaching out over the table to spear him with her judgment. “He would have me marry Harry the Heir, though I am already wed, but he does not mean to let him keep me. He will find a way to murder your falcon and take me for himself, just as he has tried to murder my cousin Lord Robert, just as he murdered Lord Jon Arryn in King’s Landing!”

The entire Council rose to their feet as one to turn lethal looks on Lord Littlefinger. Sansa was breathing heavily now, her heart bouncing rapidly in her chest. Her hands were sweaty and she felt a cold wetness underneath her arms, but her mind was blessedly clear, and a flicker of triumph was glowing in her tummy.

“My lords,” Littlefinger said beseechingly, “my ladies, why would I have murdered Lord Jon? I was his Master of Coin, and he was the only lord to show me generosity at the time. What would it have benefited me to murder him?”

“Tell us,” Bronze Yohn snarled, “tell us what it _benefited_ you, and perhaps we’ll let you live.” Gerold Grafton and Lord Benedar moved at that, but Littlefinger raised his hand, and they stopped.

“What proof could she possibly have?” he asked quietly. “She wasn’t even in King’s Landing when Lord Jon died of natural causes.”

“He told me!” Sansa cried out. “He is in love with me, my lords, he thinks of me as my mother and sometimes even calls me ‘Cat’! He told me that he poisoned Lord Jon to start a war, because he loves chaos. How else could the Lord of the Fingers have risen so high, so quickly?”

“I see what this is, now,” Littlefinger sighed and shook his head. “I must confess my shame to clear my name. Very well.” He looked up and held her gaze for a moment, narrowing his eyes, before turning to the Council. “You see, the girl has been very lonely since her entire family was murdered, though I’ve done my best to look after her and make her happy when I can. It’s not her fault, but I fear the Imp, her husband, a most debauched little creature, forced her into all manner of... _debased_ situations. Ever since I helped her escape from King’s Landing, she’s clung to me, desiring to be near me always, calling me _father_. It was her idea to play my bastard daughter, and while I agreed it was wise to keep reports of her from the Spider’s web, it made her _very_ happy to play a baseborn girl free to pursue her _passions_ , and I admit I was helpless against her smile. She came to me one night, and begged me, with tears in her eyes, and... What could I do? I am only a man, after all, and could not bear to make her unhappy. Afterwards, though, I told her it must never happen again, and I left the very next day, to avoid further temptation. I fear she has resented me all these months, for turning her away.” He sighed sadly, and looked to go on, but Sansa cut him off.

“How many highborn maidens you’ve deflowered, Lord Littlefinger,” and the contempt in her voice made his eyes flash. “It’s a wonder how you keep track of them all.”

“I keep a box of the bloody sheets under my bed,” he snapped.

She was taken aback by his crudeness, but swallowed hard and forced herself to reply. “What does a moldy old piece of cloth with a spot of blood prove, other than you’re completely revolting? Certainly it proves no more than an empty vial of the Tears of Lys?” Sansa allowed only a second for that to sink in, and pushed on before she could be questioned further. Lies and subterfuge, that was all either of them had as proof, or so Littlefinger thought. “Save your bloody sheets for another day, my lord.” She turned then to Bronze Yohn, and tipped her head courteously. “My Lord Royce, I asked your septon to examine me just yesterday. He has determined that my maidenhood is still intact, and signed this document bearing his witness.” She handed him the scroll. “He has agreed to further questioning, should you wish, my lord.”

Lord Royce looked quite stunned, but took the scroll after a brief pause and perused it carefully. He looked back at her and said, “I don’t doubt the integrity of my septon, or you, my lady. But how can this be? You were wed to Tyrion Lannister, and taken under his _protection_ for several months before King Joffrey’s wedding.”

“Lord Tyrion did not see fit to bed a child, he told me. He would have us wait until I was older.” She turned back to Petyr Baelish, an ugly look crinkling his face. She knew she should stop herself, that less was more, but she could not hold back. “Would you have it said, Lord Littlefinger, that my husband the Imp had more honor than you?”

Lady Waynwood stood up from her seat next to Lord Royce and pierced Sansa with an appraising look.

“Lady Sansa,” she said, “I take it that you do not want to marry my nephew.”

Sansa glanced at Ser Harrold, and he blinked back at her, his light blue eyes shining in the sun filtering through high windows, his lips open slightly. His thick shoulders spanned twice the breadth of his chair, and Sansa wondered how easily he could pick her up and throw her over his shoulder should she wish it. She felt the color rising in her cheeks and quickly looked away.

“My lady,” she began, clearing her throat, “I would not have the Vale place its heir in a union that would be an abomination in the eyes of the gods, which our marriage would be, for I was forced to marry in King’s Landing, and my husband still lives.”

“I see,” Lady Waynwood said shortly. “And is this the reason that you have chosen to reveal yourself to us?”

“No, Lady Waynwood,” Sansa said, taking a deep breath, “I am leaving the Vale. Today.”

A horn sounded from outside just then, and Sansa closed her eyes. _Too good to be true_ , she thought.

When she opened them again, every eye was upon her. “Lord Manderly of White Harbor has sent eight hundred men to escort me back to the North. We sail by way of Gulltown.”

Lord Gerold shook his head at that. “And why should House Grafton allow you to use Gulltown’s ports, without warning or permission?”

Bronze Yohn looked as though he had a few reasons House Grafton might want to give concession, but Sansa had an answer. “For a seat on the Council. A voice to be heard.”

“Say what you mean, girl,” Lady Waynwood demanded.

“I mean... The Vale needs no Lord Protector, certainly not the one you currently have, any more than the North needs the turncloak Roose Bolton, who murdered my mother and my brother the King at my uncle’s wedding in exchange for more _influence_!” She looked around at them all, every one a lord or lady with significant affluence and agency, every one too fearful to break tradition and forge a new way forward, a different path through history. “Rule yourselves!” she urged them. “You’ve been doing it for fifteen years in truth, now do it in name! Grant every House in the Vale a seat and a vote, and listen to each other, and help each other in times of need. You know you will be the most powerful kingdom in Westeros at the end of this winter, why should you give your combined power to one man, to a Lord Protector who might botch it all up in the end?”

Bronze Yohn shared a glance with Lady Waynwood, and then turned to Lord Nestor and Lord Corbray, seated to his other side. “The Northern girl has a point,” he said.

The horn blew again, and Sansa clenched the edge of the table nervously.

“My lords and ladies,” she said, “I would bring my cousin North with me.”

Lady Myranda shook her head and Lord Nestor said, “Surely, my dear, you see how dangerous that would be? Should we not keep Lord Robert here, under my protection?” He turned to Bronze Yohn and the rest of the Council for support.

“Lord Robert wants to come with me,” she told them. “And he knows who I am. I am very fond of my cousin and would not be parted with him, my only family still living. I know that it will be dangerous, but I am devoted to him and to his education. He will live through this winter, and then I will return him to you, I promise. He will be Lord of the Eyrie, a great lord in the East, because he will have stood at my side, and helped me take back Winterfell from the Bolton turncloaks and rebuild the North, put it to rights!”

Bronze Yohn pushed back his chair and stepped around the table to her side. He knelt and looked up at her, and she wondered if it were tears she saw in his eyes, or the glare from the sun. “Lady Sansa,” he said, “I will join my force with Lord Manderly’s, and see you safely from Gulltown. If it is our Lord Robert’s wish to join you, I do not believe we should stop him.”

Lady Waynwood nodded and said abruptly, “We should go by way of Ironoaks, so my full force can join you on the road. Perhaps we should call the Council at Runestone, Lord Royce? A Council and a trial for our dear Lord Protector, and get them both out of the way.”

“Not Runestone this time, my lady,” Bronze Yohn returned, “I’ll be in Winterfell.”

Sansa felt a great bubble building inside her, her stomach tight but light as air. She swept toward the door, the lords and ladies following her, buzzing amongst themselves. Lord Nestor and Bronze Yohn each clasped one of Littlefinger’s arms and pulled him out behind her. Lyn Corbray shared a glance with Lord Benedar and briefly shook his head, Gerold Grafton stalking out behind them.

When she reached the courtyard, Maester Colemon and Lord Robert were waiting for her, her cousin wearing the deep blue cloak on which she had painstakingly embroidered a fierce, imperial falcon, its silver wings spread wide underneath a crescent moon. When the maester saw the lords and ladies following her, his eyes went round, but he handed her a bundle of soft, gray fur. She swept her cloak around her shoulders and felt warm almost instantly, with the white wolf of her House at her back. She nodded and gave Maester Colemon a small smile and strode on, Lord Robert falling in behind her, Good Lord Robert trotting at his heels.

Ser Marlon Manderly met them at the Gate, eight hundred men ahorse behind him. He wore a light green cloak and the merman’s sigil was embroidered on his green wool tunic above his right breast. “My lady,” he said dismounting his horse and nodding almost reverently. “Lady Dustin has told us much about you. We are honored to escort you to my cousin’s seat at White Harbor, and back to the North.”

“Back to the North,” Sansa breathed with a smile, “Where I belong.”


	7. Mary Contrary I

For a man of many names and faces, Izembaro was surprisingly scarce of imagination.

“ _Atropa belladonna_ ,” he announced, holding up the sprig of lengthy purple-tipped leaves. “Of course the berries are the most potent element of the plant, but three handfuls of these leaves crushed into fine powder will suffice in a pinch. In less than an hour, one who has consumed the equivalent of two berries will be afflicted with headaches, rashes, uncontrollable perspiration, loss of balance, blurred vision. Within two hours, hallucinations, convulsions, delirium. Before three hours have passed, he will become unresponsive, and sometime during the night, his heart will give out.” Izembaro passed her the sprig, and she ran her fingers over the dark, plump fruit clustered in buds at the base of a soft oblong leaf. She plucked one shiny, ripe berry and held it carefully between the tips of her thumb and forefinger, eyeing its velvety contours, innocent in its containment.

_Dark and deadly_ , she thought, _and thoroughly ordinary. Like me_. She sighed.

Izembaro cleared his throat significantly, and she dutifully laid the sprig and berry down on the cluttered table, mindfully wiping her fingers on her dusty apron.

“Rather more exotic,” he continued, “but still available in certain corners to those who know where to look, seedlings of the _Nux-Vomica_ plant.” He stood just across the table from her, but she had to squint to pick out the focused set of his brow among the shadows settling like soot upon the room. “The tree is notable in that it blooms in cold season, producing a smooth orange fruit, similar in shape and size to an apple.”

“A poisonous apple?” she responded before she could catch herself. “How original.”

Izembaro looked at her oddly. “Do you hope to discover something original about death?” he asked. When she made no answer, he shrugged and turned to rummage along one of the shelves lining the wall. The house was full of shelves lining the walls, and the walls were full of clutter lining the shelves. Jars of black seeds, red seeds, green seeds, seeds as big as dragon eyes and seeds as small as quagmire ticks, jars of sticky sludge suspending slimy gray bodies in yellow viscosity, jars of copper pennies and brass pebbles, rotting skeletons of formerly furry little creatures, a jar with long blue feathers, one with thick red blood, one with strands of pure white horse hair, and one with what she would swear was nothing but rice. There were moldy boxes containing extensive collections of dried beetles, dried butterflies, dried spiders, dried squid. She had examined them so many times she felt that they were part of her, and she was part of them. _Pin me down and scrutinize me_ , she thought, _I’m all dried out too_.

Izembaro had turned back to the table, was holding out his hand in a fist between them. “This is no poisonous apple,” he said. “The flower and the fruit of the _Nux-Vomica_ look lovely and smell foul, but you, I know, are too clever to be fooled by common platitudes. They are only dangerous in what is contained beneath the surface, tucked away inside the pulp: these strange little discs.” He flipped his hand over and opened his palm, revealing a single shiny seed, flat and round like a coin. She leaned closer and saw that what at first glance seemed an unnatural sheen thrown by the flickering light of the lamps burning above them was actually hair, little wiry sprouts covering the disc on all sides, giving it the strange impression of a living thing, considering her and awaiting her next move. She reached out her fingertips to brush the seed’s furry face-

-and Izembaro pulled back his hand, whisked it by his jaw, and returned it, fingers opened once more above the table, palm empty, life-lines crawling in the shadows cast by the dim orange lamps.

She rolled her eyes. “Child’s play,” she said haughtily. “I could do that with my sleeves rolled up.”

He moved one hand to the brown wool at his wrist and began tucking the sleeve up his forearm. He moved efficiently and deliberately, and when he was done, held up his bare arms for her inspection, fingers spread wide. He nodded at her, eyebrows raised, so she unbuttoned the silver clasps at her wrists and copied his maneuver, quickly rolling up her own sleeves, mirroring his stance when she was finished. He reached across the table and pulled her hand between them, opened her palm and touched the tips of his fingers to its calloused center.

She darted a surprised glance at his face when he slowly spread his fingertips along the bones of her hand, down the strong lines of her fingers, and back again. She relaxed when she saw his eyes were closed, his face tilted slightly upward in concentration. Izembaro took himself for an amateur clairvoyant, but he never predicted anything interesting. In a house full of oddities, potions and poisons, one would think he might come up with something better than “a dark road winds before you, with death on two sides.”

For a girl training to be an assassin and a man supposedly trained in magic and mortality, one would think they could get around to doing something of importance. She had been here for weeks, and she had yet to see anyone from the House of Black and White besides Izembaro, or anyone at all, really, but for occasional patrons from the trading galleys. They at least brought stories from beyond Braavos, across the great grass sea and further down the coast, stories of slaves and rebellion and queens and war and dragons. Their strange clothes and stranger accents were refreshing as cool water to a withering thicket, and she drank them up like drops of dew, though it struck her that no visitors ever approached from beyond the Narrow Sea.

“ _Nux-Vomica_ ,” Izembaro said, grabbing her other hand, eyes still closed, “is as efficient as it is unsubtle.” He ran his hands lightly up her forearms to her shoulders, up her neck, behind her ears. It felt queer. She was unused to being touched. “Within fifteen minutes, a man will be racked with violent spasms, unresponsive, breathless.” He tugged a lock of her hair. “Or a woman.” She watched his plain face as his rough fingers started their slow trek back down to her shoulders. Outside, a steady rain started up, peppering the low wood roof above their heads and spattering the small gray windows. “Within thirty minutes, the breath is cut off and the heart gives out.”

_What a surprise_ , she thought dryly. She wondered if Izembaro wore another man’s face to play the part of the apothecary. He must. No man could be so boring inside _and_ out. She started when she realized he had opened his eyes and was staring back at her, brown eyes black in the muted midnight.

“Look down,” he said.

He clasped her forearms lightly, and she was surprised to see her hands clenched in fists. Izembaro squeezed three fingertips on each wrist, and her hands flipped involuntarily, little fuzzy discs slipping between her fingers to spill on the table between them.

“Child’s play?” he asked evenly.

“Pretty good,” she admitted. Even better was when he turned aside and she slipped three into the lining at her skirt’s waist, right under his nondescript nose.

“Now, _Datura_ , or jimsonweed, this is a wiser poison for the discerning assassin.” He moved to the edge of the table and picked up another deadly sprig, this one adorned with a long, spiky flower. “As efficient as the belladonna, the jimsonweed extract is odorless, tasteless, and difficult to trace in its victim. Effects set in roughly one hour after ingestion, in the form of delirium, uncontrollable sweating, difficulty breathing. Within two hours-”

“Let me guess,” she said, crossing her arms. “The heart gives out.”

“Just so,” he nodded solemnly. “There is no glory in the gift of the Many-Faced God, only finality. Who are you?”

_I am no one_ , she thought. _I have many names and many faces, but nothing in the middle. I had a sister, once, and brothers_ , she thought. _I had a mother and a father and a wolf. Ser Gregor, Dunsen, Raff the Sweetling_ , she thought. _Ser Ilyn, Ser Meryn, Queen Cersei._

“I am Mary,” she said. “Mary, Mary, quite contrary, daughter of the apothecary.”

“Of course,” he replied. “To reduce the plant to its elixir, one will-”

A pounding at the door cut off his instruction. Their heads turned at the sound and, a moment later, back to one another. Izembaro’s eyes were cold and guarded.

“Wait here,” he said and stepped through the door toward the foyer, taking one of the lanterns swinging from the ceiling with him.

_Like hell_ , Mary thought, and stuffed another handful of _Nux-Vomica_ seeds in her shoe before creeping in the shadows down the hallway behind him.

The day had been wet, almost humid, with intermittent streaks of sunlight slipping through heavy gray clouds, but it was the hour of the wolf now, and thick raindrops pelted the windows above Mary’s head where she huddled against the wall. She slid along the cold wood paneling and felt the coastal winds of a storm at midnight howling through the cracks at her back.

Men were whispering in the foyer.

Mary peeked one eye around the corner and saw that Izembaro had been joined by two foreigners just inside the door. They were clad in leather boots and breeches, wool tunics and heavy cloaks lined in thick fleece clasped at their throats, dripping rivers on the ragged woven rug beneath their feet.

“I will show you to the House you seek,” Izembaro hissed, blocking further entrance into the foyer, and Mary was surprised to hear him use the Common Tongue, “this is not the place to find what you need.”

“We heard a girl was here,” the shorter, stouter man of the pair returned. “It’s a child we need for the job.”

“Those who look to arrange the gift seek us at our House,” Izembaro whispered stiffly. “And those who seek us do so because we always complete the gift without detection.”

“I don’t seek you for riddles, man!” the foreigner huffed. Mary thought his accent was faintly familiar, though it was difficult to place over the wind whistling through the eaves.

“Go back down the road,” Izembaro ordered. “Turn left at the docks and wait for me at the edge of the bay. I will meet you within the hour.”

The taller of the two foreigners leaned closer, squinting at him through the lantern’s wavering light. A scar zigged from eyelid to earlobe and crawled in the flickering shadows.

“Heard you people had no faces,” he said, mouth gaping slightly to reveal a small snaggletooth. “Ain’t that what Ironmaker said, Gotho?”

“Shut it, you bum spike!” the shorter man snarled, yanking the door open and thrusting him into the gushing rain. “We’ll wait an hour, man, and if you don’t show, don’t think a bit of rain will stop us settin’ this piece of shit house a’fire.” He paused before stepping onto the stoop and turned back with a quizzical look. “You’ll look like you, though, eh?”

Izembaro pursed his lips as if to stifle a sneer and nodded shortly. The foreigner shrugged and stepped into the storm. Mary crept backward into the thickening darkness at the house's center. She pulled out the collection of dried squid and was leaning over it at the table of scattered poisons when he stepped through the door.

“Watch the house while I’m gone, Mary,” he said crisply, his thin wool cloak already draped about his shoulders.

“Where are you going?” she asked innocently. “Who was at the door?”

“As though you weren’t listening behind the corner,” he groused, sweeping the assorted plants into a trunk beneath the table and twisting the lock closed with a quick snap.

“Don’t you trust me?” she asked sweetly.

He shot her a look, eyebrows raised, before turning back to the hallway.

“Are you going to change your face?” Mary blurted before she could stop herself.

“I thought you weren’t listening!” he called back, boot heels clicking down the wood flooring. The outer door swung open with a creak that squealed down the walls to the back of the house, and then the door slammed shut, and Izembaro was gone, the storm was outside again, the faint whistling of dying winds and the soft pitter-patter of slowing raindrops leaving Mary with an acute loneliness settling down to her toes where she stood alone in the dark.

_I liked his face better with boils_ , she thought idly, and went into the drafty kitchen to throw another log in the furnace. _Ser Gregor, Dunsen, Raff the Sweetling_ , she thought, and fingered a _Nux-Vomica_ seed hiding in her waistband. _Ser Ilyn, Ser Meryn, Queen Cersei_.

She pulled on a pair of gloves and carefully grasped two bricks near the center of the furnace, placing them on the kitchen table. Once all her stolen seeds were arrayed on the top of one brick, she lifted the other up to the height of her nose and slammed it back down with great muster.

_Ser Gregor_ , she thought, and lifted the brick again, _Dunsen_ , the seeds crunched beneath her blow, _Raff the Sweetling_.

Izembaro had not shown her this process, but Mary placed the crushings in a pan on the fire and watched patiently as steam rose slowly. Some things, one just knew by instinct.

The night was beginning to lighten into a chrome mist by the time she had a third small deadly flask to add to her collection. She lined them up in a neat row on the kitchen table and leaned down to study them closely. Her fingers itched for Needle.

Mary, Mary, quite contrary. She sighed and ran a hand over her face. It was smooth and lovely with a straight nose, a high brow and a thick lower lip. Throughout the first few weeks of wearing it, she could make no distinction between her own skin and that of the mask, but lately she had begun to wonder if it was truly a living thing apart from herself, for she felt as though it was nearing the end of its course. Her fingers brushed up and down along her hairline, and she thought she felt the slightest hint of a line peeling away.

She wondered about the men who had knocked at the door of an apothecary’s house in Braavos at midnight, wanting to hire a child for murder. Killing. Assassination. Murder. She was more than happy to volunteer, but Izembaro had taken them to the House of Black and White and ordered her to watch the house. Mary wondered if he had grown perversely fond of her pretty face, if he did not want to see her depart with a ship of crude Ironborn.

She could volunteer- she would take a new face and sail back to Westeros on a deadly quest and a deadly ship that could have been one among the Iron Fleet. Mary wrinkled her perfect nose when she considered how strange it was, _Ironborn in Braavos_. They must have sailed around the whole damn continent, past the Arbor, around Dorne, up the Narrow Sea. Why? It was a bit much of a trip to hire out a killing, when she knew they were quite fond of performing the act themselves.

Mary nodded, decisive. It didn’t matter why: they had come to the House of Black and White seeking the gift, and she was an acolyte of the House of Black and White, not the daughter of the apothecary. She needn’t mindlessly obey Izembaro’s orders. If she did, she might never leave this house; she would spend her days producing poisons to sit upon the walls and collect dust, contained, useless and forgotten. She pulled on her warmest, driest cloak and carefully tucked her dangerous collection into various linings in her clothes. After brief consideration, she snuck into Izembaro’s bedroom, picked the lock on a desk drawer and stuffed a handful of silver coins in her shoe as well.

The salty air stung her nose as she passed the docks, hood drawn up against the mist. She eyed the boats in the harbor and wondered if the Ironborn had docked nearby. Braavos was empty of late, forlorn and listless as the winds grew colder and wetter, the galleys choosing to forgo Braavosi trade and courtesans for warmer southern ports.

Mary passed a huddle of drunken bravos over the stone bridge onto the Isle of the Gods. The purples and oranges of their flamboyant dress stood out brightly in the gray fog, unlike her own muted cloak and skirt. They were arguing enthusiastically amongst themselves, brandishing swords like squawking peacocks and took no notice of her, but she slid along the stone wall and kept her hood up nonetheless.

Red priests were feeding the flames in front of the temple to R’hlorr, but elsewise the isle was deserted, quiet. She took the long way around and walked along the perimeter, staying close to the wall. At the base of the steps leading up to a door that was black on one side and white on the other, she paused, looking around her carefully. No one was within sight, but then again, everyone around here was no one. She closed her eyes and reached, finding the ratty black cat easily. He greeted her as any feline greets an old friend, bemused but generally indifferent.

Servants were sweeping the kitchen. He hissed each time the bristles neared his nose, but did not move from where he curled at the foot of a table. The room smelled of milk, bread and warmth.

She sank down into his bones and tendons, and moved them up off the floor into the hallway nearing the main chamber. He bared his teeth at her inwardly, but then settled himself comfortably on top of her and promptly fell asleep.

The door was barred and Mary could hear muddled voices from within but was unable to understand specific words. The cat cocked his head curiously when a thin, reproachful tone wafted under the crack, and though it was quickly cut off by a smattering of lower rebukes, Mary knew the waif was within and wondered what had disturbed her.

She pulled back from the cat and looked about herself again. The wharf was silent, watchful. She carefully crept up two landings of uneven rock steps, pulled two slabs off a ledge in the wall and shoved her hand inside the gaping hole.

Mary’s breath stopped as her fingers clawed wet crumbling rock. The cat slinked back into the shadows across the hallway from the main chamber when the door opened and heavy black boots clomped toward the outer entrance. She heaved a sigh of relief when her fingers connected with cold steel. She pulled the thin sword from its hiding place just as the black-and-white door swung open, rasping grumbles bouncing through the cold wet air down the rock steps where she crouched, hurriedly shoving stones back in place.

Mary slipped down the stairwell, tucking Needle into the waistband of her skirt to prop dangerously against her bare leg, and jumped carelessly over the seawall to duck underneath one of the closer docks. She huddled against the wall’s embankment, her boots drenched in black water, and watched as the two Ironborn strode down the steps and turned onto the harbor’s walkway back toward the bridge she herself had crossed minutes ago.

“...three weeks on our ship, Gotho? Strange looking girl,” the tall vacant one slurred as they stomped past.

“Old bastard took our coin easily enough,” the other hawked and spat into the bay. “Can’t be wolves in the North when Victarion sails back with dragons.”

Mary straightened and hit her head on the deck with a crack, but the two men were almost to the bridge now, black cloaks swallowed up in the gathering gray mist. She stepped onto the walkway and stared at them as they turned and crossed onto the mainland. She turned her head and looked up at the door to the House of Black and White, pulse pounding in her throat.

“I am not one to give this gift,” the waif hissed in the hallway while the black cat prowled around their feet. “The God of Many Faces does not will it. I am too close. I know not this boy, but I know his sister.”

“That might have once been true,” the kindly man mused thoughtfully. “But now you know no one but servants of this House, and givers of the gift.”

The black cat snarled at the look that passed over the waif’s hollow face. “Do not lie to me,” she hissed. “This cannot be done, not by us.”

“The House of Black and White does not turn away those who pay the price,” the kindly man said. “It is willed by Him of Many Faces.”

“It is willed by _you_!” she spat and glared up into his crinkled gray gaze.

He looked down at her, and his face grew so hard that Arya wondered if he possessed some magic to become an entirely different person when he willed it. She felt a shiver run down her spine, and the mist turned to slow fat raindrops plinking into the bay behind her.

“I am a servant of this House,” he said coldly. “Our gift is death, not life. We do not stand between the gift and those who would pay the price. You were that price once, if you can recall. As was I.”

His gaze softened when the waif’s shoulders slumped, and once again he was the kindly man, wrinkled and benevolent. “I depend on you,” he said softly. “Do what must be done and return to me. You belong here.”

“What about the boy?” she said just as softly, and the cat wound his way around her ankles, purring as rubbed back and forth along her calf. “All he’s done is try to go home, where _he_ belongs. Do these men so fear a boy of six they cannot give him the gift themselves? Why should their miserable lives be worth more than his?”

“It is not for us to say,” he shook his head. “Power is waking in places where it has never been, dying in places it has long held ground. We change with the world and pay the price for our place, just as we always have.”

The waif looked down at the scrawny black cat and narrowed her eyes, tongue swiping over thin lips. “We should tell her. She thinks they are all gone from her.”

“If she wanted to know, she would,” he said simply. He stretched out long fingers and grasped her shoulder. “She does not want to be who she is, so she is no one, and no one has no family. You will do this?” The waif studied the kindly man through narrowed eyes, considering, and nodded once, sharply. “Good. The Many-Faced God thanks you.” His hand slid up and cupped her cheek, and the ratty cat felt her weight shift on her feet. “You belong here,” he said again. “Don’t forget who you are.”

She pursed her lips and lowered her lashes against high, thin cheekbones while he waited patiently. “Who am I?” she asked finally, looking up at him.

He pulled his hand back and took a step apart. He smiled and turned away, boots making no sound as he disappeared down the dusty hallway.

The waif stared after him for a long moment, then turned quickly on her heel and swept just as silently around the corner, down the long passageway that led to a winding stone stair. Mary took the steps up to the weirwood-and-ebony door two at a time. The black cat whined, anxious at her disturbed presence, but Mary saw through his eyes that the foyer was clear, so she pressed her hand against the smooth warm wood and whispered “ _Valar morghulis_.”

The door swung inward silently, and Mary quickly slipped inside, carefully pushing the door closed behind her. No one greeted her but the ratty cat, whose yellow eyes gleamed in the dusty indoor gloom. “ _Valar dohaeris_ ,” she whispered to him and crept down the hallway after the waif. The cat, free once more, slinked back toward the warm smells wafting from the kitchen.

_Who am I?_ she thought as she wound her way down the stair. She passed the hall that led to the small bare room where she had slept before she was sent to live with Izembaro. She heard low voices murmuring mumbled prayers and thought she recognized Umma’s animated chatter. _Valar morghulis_ , she thought, and, _Valar dohaeris_. She paused when she reached the first wrought iron door and found it unlocked, ajar. Swift as a deer. Quiet as a shadow. She slipped through the crack and continued after the waif. Around and around she crept down the steps, until the walls began to drip and she had to step carefully over shallow puddles gathered in hollows in the stone. _Ser Gregor, Dunsen, Raff the Sweetling, Ser Ilyn, Ser Meryn, Queen Cersei_.

Fifty-four steps and the second door. She squashed her nose against cold iron and tried to peer through the joining. She wished she had brought the cat with her for a second set of eyes.

_Eyes for what?_ she asked herself. _What are you going to do? Stick 'em with the pointy end! Mary, Mary, quite contrary. Hopeless, my dear, this needlework of yours just will not do! Who are you? I’m the ghost in Harrenhal. Calm as still water. Arry, Weasel, Horseface, wolf bitch, Arya Underfoot. Why would you want to ride a smelly old horse when you could lay about on feather pillows and eat lemon cakes?_

She squeezed her eyes shut and pressed her face against the door so hard she thought her nose would break and her forehead would crack, her bones would crumble and she would fall apart like dust in the wind, disintegrate into a thousand little pieces of nothing, and then she could finally rest because she would finally not be Arya anymore.

When she opened her eyes again, she was still there, a scrawny girl with knobbly knees and wild hair, a beating heart and blood flowing under her skin, standing in front of the door to a room with a thousand faces and one way home again. _Rickon_ , she thought, and pushed her way inside.

Black candles were flickering in the corner. She glanced around surreptitiously for the waif, and saw an orange glow wavering from the mouth of a tunnel across the room. Quiet as a shadow, she crept toward the candles, drawn by the light and the clean smell of summer snow.

A glass jug of light yellow liquid stood with three cups on a shelf in the corner. She hesitated a moment, then filled one of the cups and slipped her hand inside her boot. She upended the most dangerous flask of her dangerous collection into the jug and filled it again with the yellow liquid from the cup. She pushed the bottle back into her boot and huddled down into an alcove.

The waif made no noise as she approached, but orange lamplight flickered half-heartedly in the air before her. Arya watched as she leaned her head back and studied the walls. She felt something odd move in her chest when she looked at the waif, small and alone in a gaping cavern rimmed with bones and faces beneath the earth.

_She would sail to Westeros and give Rickon the gift_ , she reminded herself. _She would leave without saying good-bye, without telling me he was alive_.

The waif removed a face from the wall and slid toward the corner where Arya crouched, hidden. She walked quickly, silent as ever, but sharp, tense, and did not look about her or check the door.

The black candles flickered as the waif poured a cup and raised it to her lips. Arya smelled fresh-cut pine, damp straw in the stables, chalky mist from the hot springs. She smelled sweat from the horses after a long hunt, fresh moss and heather, the sweet, milky scent of a baby brother’s skin.

Izembaro spoke truth. Ten minutes later, the waif trembled on the wet stone floor.

Arya took a candle from the shelf and approached her. She was on her back, her arm twitching in a black puddle, her eyes huge and dark as she stared up at the ugly mausoleum above them.

The waif blinked when she noticed Arya standing over her but did not speak. Her chest rose in strangled wet gasps.

“I’m sorry,” Arya whispered. “I liked playing the lying game with you, and learning poisons from you.”

An odd look passed over the waif’s strained face, but it was gone again as another convulsion stretched her lips into a grotesque smile.

“This candle,” Arya said, kneeling and bringing it carefully closer to the waif’s twitching face, “it smells of home to me, of things that make me happy, that make me who I am. Does it smell good to you, too?”

The waif tilted her head toward the sputtering black candle, and breathed. Her head waved back and forth with tremors that racked her chest and shuddered down her thin limbs.

“I’m sorry,” Arya said again. “I thought I could do it. I thought I could be no one, but I can't. I can’t let you give my brother the gift. I can’t give up on him, not if he’s alive!”

The waif gasped, mouth opening wide with pain. The convulsions slowed, and she swallowed, blinking up at Arya behind the black candle’s feeble yellow flame.

“My- father-” she wheezed.

“It smells of your father to you?” Arya asked.

“Other things- too,” the waif whispered. “Him- mostly. Since... always.”

“He’s a part of you, then,” Arya said. “He’s some part of who you have always been... so you must be real.”

“His wife-” the waif laughed and choked, gasping. She coughed and wheezed, and her eyes fluttered shut. “Poisoned me too,” she said faintly.

“That’s how you came to be here?” The waif nodded, and she understood. “He sent you here, to become no one. But don’t you see? You can’t be no one, not if he’s still here flickering in this candle. He gave you up, but you couldn’t give him up... so you’re real. You’re...” she paused, searching for words.

“Minya,” the waif said and spread her bony fingers over her chest.

“Minya,” Arya whispered, “ _Valar morghulis_.”

When she ceased to shudder, Arya ran her hand down the waif's face, closing her eyes and straightening her jaw. She brushed her fingers around the crease that lined her own temple and chin, then pulled Needle from the waistband of her skirt.

“ _Valar dohaeris_ ,” she murmured, and slid the blade in a weeping red oval around the waif’s hollow face.


	8. Sansa IV

Sansa leaned over the railing and watched the water slip by as smooth as polished glass, waves breaking in white gusts against the ship’s prow as it sliced through the sea, and tried not to retch.

“You know I was at Winterfell not three months ago,” a voice said above her.

Sansa turned and looked up wearily at Lady Dustin standing to her left, arms resting against the smooth wood railing, wind lightly tossing brown and silver strands behind her shoulders. She glanced down at Sansa before turning her gaze back to the horizon, northward.

“Why did you leave?” Sansa asked, suppressing another shudder.

Lady Dustin did not answer immediately, contemplating the waves.

“Theon Greyjoy is alive,” she said finally. Sansa stood up a little straighter and stared at her. Lady Dustin turned her head, looking down her nose again, and continued. “Ramsay the Bastard took him after burning Winterfell to the ground.”

Sansa squinted at her, trying to understand. “I thought...” she said, “I thought Theon burnt Winterfell, after hanging my brothers. He burnt it and put all the servants to the sword.”

“No,” Lady Dustin said, “Theon Turncloak is a murderer and a coward, but it was Ramsay Bolton who left Winterfell a ruins. He took Theon alive, and the Frey boys, and killed the rest.”

Sansa tried to think what she felt about Theon. She remembered talking about girls with him while Robb made silly jokes from the doorway. She thought of Bran and Rickon, and felt empty.

“Have you seen him?” she asked.

“What’s left of him,” Lady Dustin replied. Sansa wondered what that meant.

Lady Dustin’s shoulders tensed and loosened again, the breath exhaling out her nose. “When I left Winterfell, the men there were close to starving. We were waiting to fight Stannis’ army, to get warm again, but the fight never came. The snows were seven feet high, small wonder the troops could not get through. They must have been as bad off as us, or worse.”

“How did you get out?” Sansa asked. “How did you make it to White Harbor?”

“I rode out in the dead of night with my shields, Derek and Ser Bryen. We reached the White Knife that day and found a river runner the Manderlys had hidden almost a mile off the shoreline. By water, the trip to White Harbor was only three days, though I thought my death was upon me, I was so cold.”

A gust of wind blew through Sansa’s cloak, and shivers racked her to the core. “I know how that feels,” she said.

“Believe me girl,” Lady Dustin replied, “you don’t.”

Sansa looked at her. Her gray eyes were the sea, her silvered hair the waves and the wind. She looked out calmly across the water, but Sansa noticed her hands clenched tight to the railing.

“Why are you here?” Sansa demanded. “You must know I cannot fight alongside Roose Bolton or his vile son.”

Lady Dustin turned to regard her coolly. “Are you a fighter, then, girl? Will you be out there wielding a sword or an axe, dying alongside your soldiers?”

“There is more to fighting than swinging a sword,” Sansa said nobly.

Lady Dustin snorted. “Tell that to your soldiers. I’m sure a few of them would be more than willing to trade places with you.”

Sansa narrowed her eyes at the woman. She felt Lady Dustin was making a point, but she wasn’t sure what it was.

“I joined forces with Roose Bolton because there was no other option,” Lady Dustin continued, “and because I have no children or family to fight for, so I fight for the North. And he may be a leech, but at least Roose Bolton’s ambitions have always resided firmly in the North.” 

“He murdered my brother Robb, the _King_ in the North!” Sansa snarled.

“The King in the North who _marched South_ ,” Lady Dustin responded, eyes flashing. “The King in the North who led twenty thousand northmen to cross swords with Lannisters, only _one in five_ come back, and for what? Your father’s decaying head? To topple the King from the Iron Throne, when King’s Landing had been happily ignoring us for fifteen years? All those men, that strength, wasted, and now we cannot feed ourselves through an autumn, let alone a winter.”

“If you think,” Sansa said slowly, “that I am going to take back Winterfell, put the North to rights, and let Roose Bolton walk free-”

“Of course not,” Barbrey Dustin snapped. “The man is a bloodsucker. He is so cold I doubt he’s human. I’d be quite satisfied to get rid of him for you myself.”

“No,” Sansa replied. “If Roose Bolton is still at Winterfell when we arrive, I will finish him. And his son, and any other skin-flayers still in the North. And I will burn the Dreadfort to the ground and give the land to his prisoners.”

Barbrey Dustin sneered at her. “Lady Lannister after all, I see.” Sansa thought one quick push against the railing would send her toppling overboard. “Don’t look so offended, girl, his children may have been degenerates, but you cannot deny that your good father was an unparalleled ruler who gave his people long years of peace and prosperity. Why do you think the West has been so wealthy and strong in your lifetime?”

“Because Casterly Rock sits on a mountain of gold!” Sansa exclaimed, exasperated.

“And do people eat gold, or build houses of it, or fight with it?” Sansa opened her mouth but Barbrey continued. “You can hate the dead until you rot from it, no one knows that better than me, but you will never best your foes if you do not acknowledge how they are better than you. Tywin Lannister introduced many trades in the West, including the manufacture of leathers, jewels and weapons. The West had the largest breeders of fighting and plough horses in Westeros, at least until your brother’s war. Thirty years ago, there were no large cattle farms in the West, but now they are sitting pretty at the start of a long winter, which is more than anyone can say for us.”

Sansa stewed silently, biting her tongue until she tasted blood, while Lady Dustin turned back to the sea and closed her eyes. “I know what Tywin Lannister was... and I know what Roose Bolton is, and his son. I was not long in their confidence before I became conflicted about my choices. I prayed to the old gods for guidance, and I deliberated long and hard for new answers to old questions. But the gods were silent, and I remained as confused as ever while we took Winterfell and married your trembling sister to Ramsay Bolton.”

“That could not have been Arya,” Sansa declared. “I cannot believe she would have gone through the ceremony without a fight.”

“That may be so. I see no trace of resemblance between you, and certainly saw no trace of spirit in the girl Ramsay married, as I am told Arya Stark had in abundance. But I was nearing the end of my rope, weary and angry, when my answer finally came, and from none other than Theon Turncloak.”

Sansa watched her closely and waited.

"He’s a monster, you know,” Lady Dustin told her, “a useless, decrepit monster. Ramsay took him to the Dreadfort and flayed him from nose to foot for nearly two years. Sliced off a few fingers, broke off a few toes, knocked out a few teeth. He’s not even sure who he is anymore, but Ramsay made certain he knows he’s a rat.” She spat into the sea. “Theon told me the weirwood talked to him. He told me he went to the godswood in Winterfell, and they called him by name. I went to the godswood the next afternoon, and I stood there, with my hand to the weirwood. I felt it judging me, and I waited. For _hours_. Would they chose to speak to Theon Greyjoy and not _me_? I’ve spent my whole life dedicated to the old gods, the old ways, the North. Just as I turned to leave, in a great rush, as though... as though it couldn’t bear to let me go without showing me- I saw it.” She paused, her brow wrinkled, gaze inward.

“Saw what?” Sansa asked.

Lady Dustin turned and examined her, the gray of her eyes reflecting the filtered sun. “You,” she said. “I saw a girl building a castle in the snow, and everywhere I looked, she was there. ‘ _Sansa Stark_ ’ I knew, though I had never seen you before. ‘ _Sansa Stark, alive at the Eyrie_ ’.”

Sansa remembered that day, the taste of snowflakes and innocence on her tongue, and wondered how it was possible.

“When I told Wyman Manderly what I saw,” Lady Dustin continued, “the boob told me I should ‘ _follow my dreams_ ’.” She snorted. “A Northman who worships the Seven?” She leaned far over the railing and spat into the sea again. “He thinks the weirwoods are magic. It’s not magic. It’s life. It’s the oldest force in the world, and the youngest. It’s what connects us all, even after we’re dead.” She turned to study Sansa with narrowed eyes. “You understand that, don’t you?”

“I think so,” Sansa said, though she didn’t, at all.

“Well,” Lady Dustin huffed, “I saw you, because the old gods showed you to me, and I told Wyman Manderly, who is the biggest Stark supporter in the North as anyone with half a brain would know. He sent me to find you and bring you back to Winterfell with the whole strength of White Harbor behind you, and hopefully a few forces from the Vale as well.” She raised her eyebrows at Sansa. “He couldn’t have expected that Lord Royce would gather five thousand men at your back, and three more ships besides, though the gods only know how we’ll get them all through the snow, or feed them either.”

Sansa tried be serious but couldn’t help the small smile that lit up her face at the thought of returning to Winterfell with an army behind her.

“I suppose what I’m trying to say,” Lady Dustin said severely, “is that I switched sides in this bloody war because of you, girl, and I’m not the only one. Do you think Benedar Belmore’s men, or Anya Waynwood’s, or your devoted Ser Templeton, are sailing North and freezing their balls off to fight for _me_ and win me back _my_ home? So you better damn well pull yourself together, and let those soldiers get a good long look at you and your pretty smiles if you want them to remember what they’re fighting for!” She gave Sansa one last sniff through her long nose before turning sharply and striding away across the deck.

Sansa watched her go and swallowed hard against the rising bile threatening in her throat as the ship swayed beneath her.

_ I better put on the white dress again _ , she resolved and shivered, cold to the bones at the thought.

Three days later she stood at the prow again, clutching the polished wood railing to keep herself from staggering, though this time it was Ser Marlon Manderly who joined her. She tipped her head and smiled, offering him a drink from the wine sack she had served the soldiers two levels below, but he shook his head courteously.

“No, thank you, my lady, I must be Captain and Commander, though I’m a knight, not a sailor.” He looked out across the black waters stretching before them and breathed deeply the salty air. His brow furrowed at the greying clouds gathering high above them, far to the North. “But I do not need to be a sailor to know that clouds on the horizon do not bode well.”

Sansa watched the storm swirling, small and insignificant so many miles in the distance. “We should reach White Harbor tomorrow afternoon, should we not, Ser Marlon?”

He nodded, his eyes still locked on the eddying clouds. “By morning, if the weather is clear and the wind stays at our backs.” He tore his gaze away to look at her. “When we reach White Harbor, Lord Manderly will not be there to welcome you, as his forces are still trapped by Winterfell’s snows. I have heard that... there may be other guests to greet you, who you will be very interested to meet. But perhaps I should not... in case my information was mistaken-”

Good Lord Robert jumped on her so suddenly she let out a startled scream, and Ser Marlon grabbed her arm to steady her against the ship’s railing. Sansa felt herself trembling at the thought of the icy black sheet rushing up to swallow her down. She turned on her cousin in a rage borne of fear.

“Robert!” she shrieked, “Why is he not on a leash? You should lock him in the cabin if you cannot control him on deck where he gets in everyone’s way!”

“He’s too wound up to be in the cabin,” he stormed back at her, “he’ll chew up all our things! He can’t get any exercise on this stupid boat, so he’s always full of energy!”

It was true, the dog was wound up by the flurry of soldiers and sailors, the constant sway of the boat, and the lack of space to run about. He stalked circles around the cabin for hours each night before finally settling down. Sansa usually stayed up to read from Maester Colemon’s significant store of volumes, on topics from herbology and healthcare to dragonlore and the rule of Aegon the Conqueror, so she didn’t mind the pup’s restlessness each night. She groaned every morning, though, when he stuck his nose in her face and licked her awake so she could resign herself once again to the boat’s endless sway and her unrelenting nausea.

“Find a stick,” she told Robert through gritted teeth, “hold it above your head and make him jump for it. We’ll be at White Harbor tomorrow, where you and he can get a good long walk.”

“I don’t like that trick anymore,” Robert groused, “it hurts my arm, and Good Lord Robert keeps pushing me over.”

“Robert...” she started warningly, but he stamped his foot and turned, running away from her while the excitable dog jumped and bounded behind him.

She sighed and turned back to Ser Marlon, but he bowed quickly and begged her leave to prepare the rigging in case of a storm that night. She refilled her wine sack and made one last tour amongst the White Harbor sailors, who smiled and made almost-bawdy jokes at her while she rolled her eyes good-naturedly.

That night, Good Lord Robert was a bit more relaxed than usual, though her cousin was bad-tempered and tired from having done as she suggested and held a stick above his head for an hour. He stretched his arms behind his back and groaned.

“I can’t wait to get off this ship!” he declared. “My head hurts from all the swaying, and my arms are so sore from playing with Good Lord Robert, they’ll probably fall off before we get to White Harbor!”

Sansa smirked at him. “It’s good exercise for your sword arm though, isn’t it?”

Robert brightened at that. “I suppose so... yes, I’ll be so strong, I’ll be able to take down any who try to attack me!” He flexed his bicep and looked at it appraisingly. “But who is going to teach me, Alayne, I mean Sansa? No one is better with a sword than Ser Harry! He’s just what a knight should be, isn’t he?”

_ If wars were fought and won in tourneys and melees, perhaps _ , she thought. Her mind once again turned over images of his strong arms and masculine chest, the musings so well worn in her head she thought them without thinking. “He is strong and gallant, my lord, but perhaps there is more to being a knight than that.” Ser Hardyng might look like a man, but to her he seemed as much a green and untested boy as Lord Robert. She settled back into bed and imagined strong arms around her, though, and dreamt of being held, warm and safe and happy.

The storm came that night, just as Ser Marlon feared.

Sansa woke to the sound of sails snapping and men shouting. She sat up in bed and looked over at Robert, who was clenching his covers in fists and staring up at the ceiling. He caught her gaze when she sat up, and Good Lord Robert stood from his spot next to her cousin.

“I’m sure it’s just a passing storm,” she told him. “We’ll be at White Harbor in the morning, and off this wretched boat.”

He nodded, though she could tell he did not fully believe her.

“I’ll go find Ser Marlon, and see if everything is under control,” she said, pulling on her gray dressing robe, tying her fur cloak on over it. “Wait here.”

She pushed open the cabin door and walked out into a flurry of cold, damp winds. She squinted against the tumult and saw men running every which way, bundles of ropes in their arms, lanterns swinging precariously in their grasps. She breathed through her nose and smelled salt, the sea, and something else, something warm and terrifying.

Sansa traversed the length of the deck to the prow, looking up at the rigging where men were shimmying the masts and walking the poles, yelling to each other, pulling sails and tying ropes in such a patchwork of precision that she could make no sense of it. She found Ser Marlon at the base of the mainmast, supervising as men tied back the sails, flapping so violently she feared a few would lose balance and topple onto the deck, twenty feet below.

“Lady Sansa!” he exclaimed when he turned and saw her standing at his side, eyes drawn to the men scurrying above. “You should return to the cabin, my lady, the storm is only just upon us.”

“Can I help in any way?” she asked.

“No, it is no use to have too many people on deck,” he told her. “Please, go back to the cabin and stay there with your cousin until the storm passes.”

“We will still make it to White Harbor tomorrow, won’t we, Ser Marlon?”

A great creak turned their attention upward, and the wind gusted so hard, Sansa staggered forward and clutched the mast to remain standing. The ocean spray stung her skin, tiny crystals piercing her cheek.

“Go back to the cabin, Lady Sansa!” he ordered her, before turning and running back to the ship’s stern.

She fought her way through the wind and had just reached the cabin when a great clap of thunder shook the wood beneath her feet, through her bones all the way to her teeth. The scene was suddenly illuminated as bright as day, and Sansa saw the thin bolt of lightning etched through her lids when she squeezed her eyes shut.

She flung the cabin door open and came face-to-face with a very distressed Good Lord Robert. He was standing on the bed, muscles tense. He growled at her when she entered.

“Where is Robert?” she asked him. She scanned the little room, but saw no sign of her cousin. “Where is he?” she asked again.

A clattering from above told her the rains had started. It grew louder and sharper, and Sansa tried to breathe deeply and clear her head against the noise. The dog started barking, a high-pitched yelp with no end, and turned circles on the bed. She covered her ears and tried to think where her cousin had gone. She heard a terrible groan from above and the ship swayed so hard she fell against the wall. The shriek of wood creaking around her grew, and the dog barked and barked, the rains pounding hard against her ears.

“Shut up, shut up!” she screamed at Good Lord Robert, and without thinking, turned and opened the cabin door once more.

She ran quickly through the storage space on the lowest level, horses neighing and moving restlessly in their stalls. She passed through the soldiers’ barracks and paid no mind to their gaping, ran to the tiny kitchen and through the dining hall but saw no sign of Robert, and started climbing back up the stairs.

She ascended the ship’s deck and into another world. The storm raged around her, a tornado of winds and water. Buckets of cold rain assaulted her from all sides, and she placed her hand above her eyes to squint through the deluge to find her way forward, but even so, she could not see more than three feet ahead. An icy wave knocked her to her knees, and she scrabbled along the deck until she found the railing and held on dearly, crawling forward inch by inch.

“Robert!” she screamed. A man ran past her, and another wave ran down the deck, drenching her where she crawled. “Robert!” she screamed again.

She felt a hand on her elbow and turned hopefully. But it was Maester Colemon, pulling her to her feet and wrapping an arm around her shoulders as he steered her carefully to the middle of the deck. “Lady Sansa,” he gasped, “I saw your cabin was empty and came looking for you. You shouldn't be up here!” he shouted, as the rain intensified, bouncing against the wood in sharp, white crystals. “You must stay below deck!”

“Robert is gone!” she shouted back at him. “I have to find him!”

The maester shook his head and continued pushing her closer toward the stairs. “I will come back up and look for him once I see you to the cabin!”

“I cannot leave him in this storm!” she screamed. “I must find him now! _Robert_!” she screamed again.

“My lady,” Maester Colemon started, agitated, but was interrupted by another shout.

“ _Girl_!” she heard, “The boy is here, come help me with him!” Sansa rushed forward a few steps and saw Lady Dustin’s blurred form, kneeling underneath the mizzenmast. Sansa dropped to her knees when she saw her cousin laying beneath her, a bright red pool sloshing back and forth around him.

“What's happened to him?” Sansa cried, seeing Robert’s closed eyes and white, white skin, bright against the darkness whipping around them.

“His arm’s been speared,” Barbrey Dustin responded, “a splinter from the mast, stuck straight through. Maester,” she spat, glancing up at him with distaste, “grab his legs, I’ll carry his torso.”

They walked him carefully below deck, staggering through the storm while Sansa hovered and moaned.

The stillness and warmth of the cabin was almost deafening compared to the hurricane seething above, and Sansa felt suddenly claustrophobic. Good Lord Robert watched them underneath the bed, trembling.

“No, put him on the floor,” the maester instructed when Barbrey made to set him on the mattress. “We’ll need to wrap him in dry blankets once we’ve seen to the wound.” Lady Dustin narrowed her eyes but obeyed.

They huddled around Lord Robert while Sansa stood at the door and stared, breath ragged.

“Hold his chest,” the maester commanded the north woman, and he gripped the splinter sticking grotesquely out Robert’s tiny, helpless arm, and pulled it out in one quick yank.

Robert screamed and twitched, but did not wake, and after a moment his movements stilled, head slumped to the side.

“I need my supplies,” the maester said. “We’ll need to stitch it. Hold it shut if you can, to staunch the bleeding.” Barbrey gripped Lord Robert’s arm firmly, two flaps of skin pushed taut together. The maester exited the cabin swiftly, and Sansa swayed, her head heavy.

They stayed like that for a few moments, Barbrey Dustin holding her cousin’s ruined arm together while Sansa leaned against the door and tried not to faint.

Robert started to tremble. She looked down at him, terrified, and heard a faint clicking noise emanating from the back of his throat.

“Oh no,” Sansa moaned.

“What?” Lady Dustin looked up at her, and then back down at Lord Robert. “What is it?” Sansa moved and knelt next to her cousin, placing her hands on his chest.

“A fit,” she said, “he’s going to have a fit.”

The shaking started, small at first, just a few twitches from his core, but it intensified until his whole body was racked with shudders, his head lolling from side to side, his small limbs smacking relentlessly against the wood underneath him.

“I can’t hold it together,” Barbrey grunted. “Here, take his arm, and I’ll hold him down. Just place your thumbs to either side, and push the skin together.”

Sansa stared down at the long, gaping hole in her cousin’s arm and felt sick. She shook her head. “I can’t,” she said.

“Girl!” Lady Dustin snarled as his whole torso lifted off the ground and flailed rabidly, “Take his arm, _now_!”

She grabbed the wound without thought, swallowing against the bile at her throat, and pressed the skin together, dark red blood seeping through the line and down her fingers.

Maester Colemon entered and found Lady Dustin straddling her cousin, her ankles locking his legs to the floor and her hands firmly holding his chest while Sansa clutched his arm.

“Oh no,” the maester groaned.

“Give him something to calm him!” Lady Dustin demanded over her shoulder, but Sansa shook her head adamantly.

“No!” she cried, “He cannot have it! He cannot have it ever again!” The maester ignored them both and knelt at Sansa’s side, opening his case and taking out a needle to thread with a wiry black string. Sansa could barely keep her grip on Robert’s arm, slippery with blood and flailing with each shudder.

“I cannot hold him still!” Lady Dustin grunted. “You will never be able to get that needle through with him twitching like this. Sweetsleep will do the trick if you have it.”

“ _No_!” Sansa screamed, but Maester Colemon pushed down on Robert’s chest with one hand and held the needle out to her.

“Do it, my lady,” he gasped, “Lady Dustin and I can keep him still.”

She stared at the tiny nettle, a little gleaming spear in the maester’s fingers, and shook her head. “I can’t!” she cried. “I’ve never... I _can’t_!”

Lady Dustin squirmed back to get a better hold on Robert’s legs and grabbed his wrist while Maester Colemon held his chest down firmly and gripped the shoulder, his ruined arm held out between them.

She shook her head feverishly. “I can’t, I can’t!”

“Give him the drug,” Lady Dustin snapped at Maester Colemon. “Give him the drug and stitch him up, and we’ll put him to bed and be done with this!”

“ _No_!” Sansa screamed. “HE CAN’T HAVE IT! He can’t have sweetsleep or dreamwine or anything, ever again! He must be strong! His blood must be clean, we must take care of him! He can’t have it, he can’t have it, _he can’t have it_!”

She saw Lady Dustin’s arm flash in front of her before she heard the crack of knuckles against her face and felt the sting of a swift backhand on her cheek. She let go of Robert’s arm and clutched her face in her hands, slick and slippery with her cousin’s blood. She felt bile rising in her jaw and crawled hastily into the corner of the cabin before retching violently. She smelled eggs and lamb, and retched again.

“ _Fuck_ ,” she heard a voice hiss to her left.

“Lady Dustin!” another voice responded, shocked.

“Maester Colemon,” Lady Dustin replied, “What is your _fucking_ plan to save this child between the two of us, with her raving in the corner?”

Sansa moaned. _He can’t have any of it_ , she thought, again and again. She saw Robert, flailing uselessly as his eyes flicked back and forth underneath his eyelids. She saw dark blood seeping endlessly from the black, gaping hole in his arm, and she tried to remember how to form a coherent thought, how to breathe and stay calm, but her mind was blank, blank but for sweeping, swirling terror.

_ The gods _ , she thought suddenly. _I will pray to the gods for help_. “ _Crone_ ,” she started her prayer, but stopped because she could not remember the rest. Sansa squeezed her eyes shut and whimpered, gasping brokenly as she rocked back and forth.

“ _Crone_ ,” she started again, but her mind was useless as a lone white feather, floating in the wind.

“ _Mother_ ,” she thought suddenly, and remembered the glint of afternoon sun on auburn air in summer, the gleam of a quick, small smile. “ _Father_ ,” she remembered next, a stern glance to hide the laughter behind his eyes. “ _Mother, Father_ ,” she started again, “ _Brothers, Sister_.” The words echoed around and around her head, and she felt them all, huddled about her holding hands, their heads bowed so she could not see their faces. “ _Mother, Father, Brothers, Sister_ ,” she prayed again, and felt the tiniest bit stronger than she had a moment before. “ _Mother, Father, Brothers, Sister_ ,” she opened her eyes and looked over at Lord Robert, trembling on the cabin floor. _Cousin, Cousin, Cousin_.

“I’ll do it,” she said, and their faces turned to her, one concerned, the other doubtful. She ran a shaking hand over her face, from temple to jaw, and wiped away the stickiness around her mouth. “I’ll do it,” she said again and crawled back to where they kneeled over Lord Robert, taking the needle from Maester Colemon’s fingers.

“Thank the gods,” Lady Dustin muttered. Sansa pulled the string taut, they pushed Lord Robert firmly to the ground, she clenched the two flaps of her cousin’s arm together with her left hand and pierced him straight through with the needle in her right.

Robert flailed again, but Lady Dustin and Maester Colemon held him down, and his arm barely moved in front of her. It was easier work than she had expected, the fabric of his skin tougher than her usual needlework. Her mind cleared, and she focused solely on the task at hand, sewing him up in tidy little stitches. She pulled the string taut again and tied it close to the skin as she had seen in a picture in one of Maester Colemon’s books, tearing the extra thread with her teeth. She grabbed a clean cloth from the maester’s bag and damped it in the bucket of cool water next to the bed, then ran it along the wound gently, wiping away the excess blood. She found a small roll of fabric at the bottom of the maester’s case and wound it firmly around her cousin’s arm. When she was done, she sat back and looked at her handiwork, raising a hand to brush wet hair from her mouth.

“That was well dressed, my lady,” the maester nodded at her, still holding her cousin’s shoulders. The fit had almost completely subsided, so they stripped him quickly, tossing his wet, bloody clothes in a pile on the floor, and wrapped him tightly in the bed’s thick blankets.

“Will he be alright?” she asked Maester Colemon.

“I think so,” he reassured her. “Stitching the wound was the most pressing concern, to stop the blood flow. He should sleep until morning, and will be in substantial pain when he wakes, but he _will_ wake.”

Sansa nodded, and thought about exchanging her own wet clothes for dry blankets. Then she remembered the pool of vomit she left in the cabin’s corner and felt sick again, from shame this time. She took the bloody rag and scooped the mess into a bucket.

“Will you stay with him, Maester?” she asked, heading for the door. “I just want to clean this up, and clear my head for a moment.”

“My lady,” he started, worried.

“The storm has passed,” she reassured him, and they both listened for a moment, but could no longer hear pounding gales or creaking sails, and the floor beneath them was steady for once. “I will be only a moment, I promise,” and she turned to the door before he could stop her.

When she had emptied the bucket over the edge, she breathed deeply and leaned against the sturdy wood gratefully, her head swimming. A few tears trickled down her cheeks before she shook her head and gripped the railing, forcing herself to look into the slowly clearing dawn with dry eyes.

_ It’s over _ , she thought, _we’re alive, and we’ll make it to White Harbor today_. Sansa looked down at the water, calm and innocent once more, and smiled to herself. _White Harbor today_ , she thought, _and then, Winterfell_.

She heard the shriek of wood and a hoarse shout behind her. She turned at the sound and saw the swinging jib a second before it slammed across her temple, knocking her over the railing, toppling her overboard as clumsily as a rag doll. Icy arms reached up to greet her, yanking her down into the depths of a dark night as cold and black as polished onyx.


	9. Jon III

The yard rang with the clanging of steel at work, the creaking of wood splintering. Tormund Giantsbane sat atop his shaggy gray gelding, his thick cloak as dirty and matted as his horse, and shouted commands at the wildlings hoisting the twisted white framing going up to replace the great hall’s sodden posts.

“To the left, Harlon!” he shouted, blue eyes bright, his long white hair tied at the nape of his neck. “I said _left_ , you buggering idiot!” Harlon briefly released his side of the framing to flash Tormund a rude gesture before fitting the piece squarely along the open side. “O’course I meant _my_ left,” Tormund continued, “any man with a squirt of brains would’ve known that. There, that almost looks straight,” he mused, leaning back in his saddle and squinting against the warm yellow light reflecting off the Wall’s shiny surface. “As straight as me cock, anyway, so it should do just fine!”

Jon rolled his eyes and passed the group without comment. At the Nightfort’s eastern side, Leathers was among the wildlings breaking slabs of heavy white stone into workable pieces. Two days after his arrival, Sandor Clegane had rigged a harness between eight of their hardiest horses with his own black courser at the lead, and led a group of two hundred through the woods for nearly half a morning to a ledge he had passed on his journey from Eastwatch by the Sea. Jon had followed and swung his pick like all the rest, helped sharpen blades and staggered under the heavy weight of granite, made the trip between the quarry and the Nightfort at least ten times, and the trip from the ledge to the horses’ sled a thousand. The snows continued to hold off, and he even lost count of the number of days when they felt the sun’s weak glare on their faces.

In the clean white forest away from the Nightfort’s rotting walls and the smoke of Melisandre’s continually burning fires, Jon felt something begin to ease inside him. The quarry clanged with the sound of clashing steel and breaking granite. The wildlings told tall tales to pass the time, but Jon hacked at the stone with single-minded purpose. The ache in his arms and the strain between his shoulder blades began to take its toll, and Jon reveled in the pain. It had been a long time since he felt altogether inside his own body.

The men tried to draw him into conversation from time to time, and Jon found the words didn’t weary him as much as they had before. Mostly, he hacked rocks apart and carried them to the sled to be brought back to the Nightfort. Sandor Clegane kept the parties busy and directed the work so that the horses could make three full trips each day. Jon followed orders and tried to think as little as possible. He marveled at how clean he began to feel, crusted in sweat and granite powder.

“Where did you learn masonry?” Jon asked Clegane one evening as they walked alongside the horses, Clegane leading his mercurial stallion through the snowy woods.

“Never did,” he snorted and slapped a gray gelding’s flank to get him to pick up his feet.

Jon looked at him in surprise. “Then how do you know to lead the men in work?”

Sandor shrugged. “You’ve been splitting rocks all week, boy, and as I’ve said before, you’re no genius.”

“What are we to do with it all, then?” Jon asked impatiently. “The wildlings live in makeshift homes, they won’t know how to put up a wall.”

“It takes Starks to put up a wall, does it?” Clegane side-eyed him. “If it’s been done before, we can do it again.”

“And that’s it?” Jon said, growing angry. “We have no masons, all the Watch’s Builders left as soon as they caught sight of us. The Nightfort is a ruined mess. When the snows start again, we’ll all be dead!”

“Boy,” Clegane barked, “how did you last an entire year as Lord Commander before being stabbed? The only way anything gets done is by _doing_ it. You’re a leader, you should know that.”

“Nothing ever goes the way it should,” Jon argued. “Nothing is ever _easy_.”

“Nothing worth doing,” Sandor Clegane agreed.

They trudged through the snow in silence for a few minutes. The free folk followed behind, axes slung over their shoulders. Crows took to the graying skies as they passed, ribald shouts and barking laughter startling them off their branches.

“They follow you,” Jon commented.

“What, these mangy dogs?” Clegane looked about at the straggly-haired wildlings pacing the woods behind them. “It’s the appearance of strength they can understand that has them so enamored, like moths to a flame.” Jon must have grimaced at the allusion, for Clegane gave a short rasp of mirth. “Touchy, aren’t you?” he said. “One would think _you_ were the man with half a face.”

“I just thought you might like to know,” Jon said sullenly.

“Some army you’ve got, boy,” Clegane snorted. “Not a man among them with proper discipline. Every one of them thinks he’s a right warrior, but I’ll be damned if there’s a real soldier to be found within fifty miles.”

“I know that,” Jon said, irritated. “It’s not as though I plan to set them against Lannisters in battle.”

“Not such a far stretch from Lannisters to Boltons,” Clegane countered. “This lot won’t make it fifty yards from Winterfell before they’re carved up like pigs on a butcher’s block.”

“I’m not taking them to Winterfell,” Jon snapped through gritted teeth.

“No?” Clegane rasped, turning toward him. “Isn’t that why your brothers sliced you to ribbons? Because you turned your back on them and roused the wildlings to march South?”

“I-” Jon’s bitter words caught in his throat, and he swallowed them down, though the taste was foul. “That is- Yes, I was going to march south to aid King Stannis against the Boltons, because he was the only King to answer the Watch’s pleas for help.”

“Right, and because it is Winterfell,” Clegane smirked, “and you’re the Bastard of Winterfell. And now?”

“Now I’ve died and come back to life,” Jon said sourly. “Now I’ve been brought back by Melisandre’s Red God.”

“So, what? She’s set you on some divine mission?”

“Do you think I can stand to listen to her preaching?” Jon spat. “It’s her fault I am what I am. I cannot return to my father’s seat, where the old gods are worshipped. He would be sick to see me contaminate Winterfell.”

“Would he?” Clegane mused thoughtfully. “Don’t think he would’ve had enough imagination for that.” Jon turned to glare at him, but Clegane took no notice. “All anyone could ever say about your father was what an _honorable_ man he was, except for, well, he had you, didn’t he?” Clegane turned and squinted at him in the graying dusk. “Bet you’ve heard that all your life, right, boy? That you’re living proof your father wasn’t so perfect.”

“Why are you saying this to me?” Jon asked.

“You should know that he _lied_ ,” Clegane answered. “I was there on that damned stage when Joffrey commanded Ilyn Payne to cut your father’s head off. But before that, he confessed to lies, he said that he had conspired to take the throne. I heard it from his own mouth, and even then I wondered, Why? Why would a man who upheld truth and honor, a man who anyone with eyes could see hated King’s Landing and didn’t desire the crown for himself, why would he choose to lie with Cersei’s tongue, when he had to have known it very well could be the last thing he’d ever say?”

Jon stared down at his muddy boots and kicked a chunk of ice. He didn’t want to think about such things, and he didn’t see why Clegane was talking about it, Clegane who had stood by and watched while Ilyn Payne swung his father’s sword. “The Lannisters must have forced him!” he spat angrily. “They locked him up, who knows what they were doing to him-”

“If you think your father was a man to be turned by rough treatment,” Clegane sneered, “well, you might have thought you understood what he was about, but you didn’t know him at all.”

“So tell me,” Jon snarled, “if _you_ of all people understood him so well.”

“Because of _your sister_ ,” Clegane said as though explaining to a small child why snow was white, why grass was green, why spring followed winter. “Because of the pretty little bird. Because they promised they wouldn’t kill her if he played their game. Because above truth and honor, he held his family. Not the family _name_ , not the family reputation or the family House, but the _family_. You don’t know how rare that is among highborns, believe me, boy, you don’t.”

“I didn’t know that about Sansa,” Jon said, a sudden feeling of desperation confusing him. “I didn’t really believe them when they said he had confessed. I thought that it would be a dishonor to think such things... It’s terrible, to never see someone like that again, a person who was the best you ever knew, and- and you’re meant to grieve and let go, but to have all these questions and _doubts_ brought up by words from the people who killed him, are you supposed to _believe_ them, these people who _lie-_ ”

“You can believe me, boy,” Clegane said quietly. “My father feared my brother, for he was a monster even as a boy, but more than that, he feared what people would say of him. He let me grow up the country lord’s second son who was such a clumsy boy he tripped and fell into the fireplace, while my brother ripped through local whores and millers’ sons, gnawing on their bones when he was done. _Your_ father forsook his most cherished notions about himself and died knowing people would sneer of what a lying traitor he was, all for whatever small protection he believed Sansa would gain from it. When I understood that- when I heard he had been offered his daughter’s life in exchange for his confession- I realized that your father _was_ a good man, as good as anyone ever said he was. Certainly made of better stuff than what I come from.”

“I didn’t know that about Sansa,” Jon repeated and felt his heart pumping painfully in his chest. Something hot and sticky was washing through him, breaking in his sternum. He was grateful it was almost full dark now, for Sandor Clegane led the horses out of the shadowy woods and up the hill to the Nightfort. Jon wiped tears from his cheeks before they could freeze on his face.

“Did you see my sister Sansa much when you were in King’s Landing?” Jon asked as he trudged up the hill. Clegane turned to look back at him, fingers clenched around the leather reins.

“Why do you ask me that?” he grunted.

Jon shrugged. “You used her first name. It sounded as though you knew her.”

Clegane turned back around, and Jon saw his wide shoulders hunch downward. “Yes, I knew her. Joff appointed me to the bleeding Kingsguard, one of his first acts as King, did you know that?” He reined the team to a stop, and he and Jon started the work of detaching the sled. “You ever dream of being a knight when you were a boy?” Clegane asked.

“I did,” Jon replied, surprised at the question. “It’s not such a tradition in the North, but every child hears the stories growing up, like the Sword of the Morning, and for bastards who can’t expect to inherit their father’s seat-” he shrugged.

“Bastards and second sons,” Clegane nodded. “Joff gave me a spot on that shining order of brave knights and fearless soldiers, and I jumped at it like a little boy.” He snorted and wrenched a leather strap out of a knot in the harness. “We were the sorriest lot in history to put on the white cloaks.”

Jon pulled the last knots free and tied the loose cords together. “What about my sister?” he asked. “How did she come to be married to the Imp, when she was dragged down to King’s Landing to marry Joffrey? 

Clegane looked at the wet fraying rope gripped in his thick fingers. “Don’t know, boy,” he said shortly and yanked the reins dangling from his courser’s black mane. The horse snorted angrily and began leading the team across the courtyard toward the Nightfort’s stables.

“But you were there,” Jon protested, hurrying after him, boots crunching holes into the icy snow. “You just said that you were on the Kingsguard, you must have heard that it was going to happen-”

“I told the King to go fuck himself,” Clegane rasped. “Had to make my exit pretty quick after that.”

Jon followed him into the dank structure and started untying the knots in the harness. “I would go to Winterfell if I could,” he said, trying to explain. “I would be Warden of the North, as Stannis wanted, if I could.” He shook his head and checked the grey gelding’s feet before shutting him in a rotting pen. “I’d never been anything but the Bastard of Winterfell before I came to the Wall. I said the words, and put on the black cloak, and they made me Lord Commander. I loved a girl and broke my vows, and I’d do it again a thousand times if it meant I would see her smile again. It’s so dark these days that I can hardly remember what she looked like, but I know her smile is the sweetest thing I’ve ever seen.” He swung the last door closed, and rising calls between the wildlings swept through cracks in the wet stone walls. “There has to be a reason for it,” Jon said, looking back at Sandor Clegane. “I loved her, but she died, and I loved the Watch, but they killed me.” He laughed painfully. “And I hate Melisandre, but she brought me back to life.”

“You mean to stay here?” Clegane demanded. “What of your sisters? The Wall may be your home now, but what of theirs? They’ll stay lost as long as they have nowhere to go.”

Jon shook his head. “They took Arya back to Winterfell and married her to Ramsay Bolton.” Each time he thought he’d found the bottom of his shame, the ground gave way beneath his feet and Jon fell deeper down the hole.

Clegane turned sharply. “When did you hear that?”

“Months ago,” Jon said dully. “I was going to march south and save Stannis, and Winterfell, and Arya.” He moved toward the door, but Clegane blocked his exit.

“There’s something I suppose I should tell you,” the other man said, rubbing his bristly jaw. Jon stared up at him, and the horses shifted anxiously in their pens.

When Clegane paused for breath, Jon found his fingers clenching Longclaw’s hilt so hard his knuckles ached, his palm slippery against the cold leather grip.

“Dondarrion meant to drag her around the bloody country while the lions burned whole villages to the ground,” Clegane rasped. “She’d already survived my brother’s camp- might be she’s a fierce little wolf who could take care of herself, if she weren’t a girl in the middle of a war, and a Stark to top it off. I was on my way to meet your brother Robb at the Twins, or I was before the damned crusaders of the night took me down and brought me to the Lightning Lord and his thrice-damned fire priest.”

Jon stretched his fingers along the hilt resting on his hip. “So?” he demanded. “What then? What of Arya?”

“He tried to fight me with fire, the bastard!” Sandor Clegane snarled, unconsciously rubbing his hand over his bicep.

“Clegane-” Jon warned.

“I took her with me, alright? I stuck my sword through Beric Dondarrion’s chest, and his fucking sorcerer closed the wound and made him breathe again- and here you thought you were the original,” he sneered, lips pulled wide across one side of his face. “They let me go- said I had passed the Red God’s test, that it was his will I should live. Religious types, you know.” Jon lost his patience and tightened his grip, sliding Longclaw from its sheath with a swish of steel against leather. “Easy, boy,” Clegane protested, “I’m getting there, I am. Well, I- like I said, she couldn’t expect her luck to live forever, and the Brotherhood without Brains kicked me out after their Lightning Lord died the sixth or seventh time... so I took her.”

Jon raised the blade to waver threateningly under Clegane’s hooked nose. “What do you mean,” he said threateningly, “you _took_ her?”

“I told you!” Clegane raised his eyebrows, hands coming up slightly in front of his chest, fingers spread wide. “I was going to offer my services to your brother, so I took her with me!”

“You took her with you?” Jon snarled, and Clegane stepped back through the stable door into the dark night beyond. “Or you _took her_?”

“What are you on about, boy?” Clegane growled. “Get that out of my face.”

“Did you give her a choice? Did you ask her if she would come with you?” Jon’s voice was growing louder with each step they took further into the courtyard. Clegane laughed, a grating sound like rocks breaking, and Jon poked Longclaw threateningly at his throat.

“Enough,” Clegane growled, slapping the blade down with one gauntleted wrist. “Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten your own sister? Couldn’t very well _ask_ her to come with me, she’d have stuck that tiny sword in my knee, the little rat.”

“Needle?” Jon said, and the cold air snapped at his cheeks, touching him oddly where he swayed, moored inside his own body. He weighed the sword in his hand and raised it again, leaning forward into an offensive stance. “Where is she?” he demanded. “What happened to her?”

Clegane held his hands up defensively and seemed to shrink slightly. “I don’t know,” he said, shaking his head. “We were caught in a fight. I was injured, couldn’t walk. Never been closer to death, and the little wolf left me on the banks of the Trident.” He looked past Jon’s shoulder. “I lost her.”

“I see,” Jon said, narrowing his eyes. “You were in King’s Landing with Sansa, and now she’s lost. You were in the Riverlands with Arya, and now she’s lost, too.” He stepped forward, a strange well of desperation breaking inside him. “And you’re at the Wall with me, but I’m already lost, Sandor Clegane, so what are you doing here? What do you want from me?” The blade shook where it pointed at Clegane’s heart.

“Come on, boy,” the man said gruffly, “I know you don’t have a death wish, not really.”

“What do you know-” Jon started, but was interrupted by an angry shout tumbling through the cold night down a hill south of them.

“Get off me!” the man screamed, “You ugly whore-son, GET OFF-” His outraged yell abruptly cut off, and the night seemed to still, sounds from the surrounding forest muting, conversations dying out while they all turned in the direction of the man’s shout, up the hill and outside the fire’s ring of light, standing in a black void of waiting. It seemed to Jon that the air had been sucked out of the night for a brief eternity of trepidation, when it suddenly returned with a great, swelling _whoosh_.

“ _FIRE_ _!_ ” another man screamed. Other voices took up the call, bouncing back through the courtyard to the Wall where Melisandre stood next to her flames. “GET THE FIRE, THEY’RE COMING!”

“They’re coming,” Jon said to himself and locked eyes with Sandor Clegane.

“ _They’re here!_ ” another voice screamed.

Jon turned toward the void.

“What-” Clegane started, but Jon was already running up the hill, Longclaw slashing the air at his side.

He met the first a third of the way from the top, and slammed the blade square into the bridge of its nose. It staggered back, and the sword slipped out the wound in its head as easily as a knife through spoilt cheese. The wight took two steps back and another forward, so Jon spun the blade up again and sliced the head from its neck. The severed head toppled to the snow with a _splat_ , but its ragged body remained upright.

“Here’s one!” Jon shouted, turning back to find wildlings riding up with torches in hand. A man rode forward and set flames to crackling from the headless body’s neck.

“What in seven hells-” Jon heard and saw Sandor Clegane standing well away from the torches, staring in horrified fascination.

“Form a perimeter!” Jon shouted at the horsed men. “From the Wall to the hill, fifty paces from the forest. We need another hundred men to stand with torches between the horses- Where is Tormund? Where is Tormund Giantsbane?” he demanded.

“Jon-” Sandor Clegane grunted, and Jon had time only to turn and see glimmers of fire reflecting in the whites of his eyes before the dead were upon them.

Blackened skin sloughed off their bright white bones, their cloaks, surcoats and trousers torn and matted, stained with blood, old skin, gore, carnage dripping from yawning holes where mouths once smiled, from feeble claws which once were fingers. This was a sorry lot, Jon decided after he’d removed head from shoulders the third time that night. They seemed weak to Jon, ragged and bony- and dead, not to mention.

Jon swept through the horde of falling wights with steel and purpose. The wights stepped back to let him pass like thralls to a ruthless master, and Jon returned their courtesy in kind with the snick of bones popping, the crackling of rotten flesh aflame.

Clegane slashed after him, pushing back the horde that swelled in the wake Jon left behind. There were those that would continue to spar without head or hands, but once Clegane rid them of their legs, there was nothing for them to do but twitch in the snow and wait for the fire.

“Where is Tormund?” Jon called to a man passing on a skittish roan mare. The man turned at the waist and pointed with his torch to a grey gelding rearing above a crowd of clawing wights, the craggy wildling’s foul curses indistinguishable through the steel singing and flames crackling.

Jon stuck Longclaw in the back of a wight who was clinging from Clegane’s arm while the man attempted to slash at two others. Jon steered the wight away, wrenched the sword from its back and snicked its head off.

“Come on!” he yelled at Clegane, who savagely hurled his blade around at the two wights attacking him, slicing them to ribbons. Gore and blood as black as night covered him from head to heel. He looked down at Jon and nodded.

Jon sprinted down the hill and halfway through the courtyard toward Tormund. Again the dead parted before him, and again he thanked them with blood and fire. He heard Clegane’s rasping pants behind him.

“Tormund!” he shouted, approaching the grinning wildling where he sat his horse, shoving flames in the faces of the foremost wights, holding the line before the Nightfort. A few more paces, and they were close enough to hear his swearing.

“I’ll finish every last one of you- take _that_ , you cunt!” he yelled. “THUNDERCUNT!”

“Tormund!” Jon shouted again. “Pull back your line, gather a hundred or so and form a perimeter-”

Torch and sword slashed gold and silver in his hands. “Whore-sons!” Tormund snarled.

“GO!” Jon shouted. “Clegane and I will hold them off- we need to burn the lot.”

Tormund gave one last vicious swipe of blade and fire, then wheeled the horse around, calling for his line to fall back.

“We’ll hold them off ourselves, will we?” Clegane grunted at him, and Jon noticed he was limping slightly, favoring one leg when he took a defensive stance.

“Thought you’d prefer this to torches,” Jon panted. “Just stay behind me and clean up the stragglers.”

Jon jogged up and down the line and one after the other, they stepped back from him, and he cut them down. The crowd surged forward when Tormund and the others fell back, but it only compressed the wights down the hill from the forest into the courtyard. The men bearing torches surrounded them quickly, and soon enough there were none left inside the ring of fire but Jon, Clegane and the dead.

“My lord!” Jon turned at the shout and saw Satin gesturing wildly next to the fires burning at the Wall’s base. Melisandre stood behind him, arms raised, face turned up to the black night. “ _My lord_!” Satin cried again. Melisandre’s outstretched arms looked to Jon like weirwood branches, smooth and pale and lovely.

He turned to Clegane. “ _Run_!” he shouted and leapt through the ring of torches toward the Wall. When he turned back again, the men holding the perimeter around the wights were cowering around a ball of flame burning angrily, licking at their hands and faces.

“Fucking hell,” the Hound muttered at his shoulder.

“Jon!” Val rode toward them, black streaks marring her singed cheeks, her long blonde braid straggly on her shoulder. “Gods, where did they come from?”

“You’ve seen such things before?” Sandor Clegane rasped incredulously. Jon ignored him.

“They may have breached the ice,” he said, sheathing his bloody sword and moving back toward the Nightfort. “It could not have been far from here. We’ll have to climb the stair and keep watch.”

“We won’t be able to see until dawn,” Val protested. “What if there’s been a break in the Wall?”

“If there’s been a break in the Wall,” Tormund fell in behind them as they passed the burning pyre, “there’s not a shit’s worth of anything we can do about it.”

“So we’re to sit here and wait for more to come?” Val rounded on him angrily.

“Aye,” Tormund grunted, “and then we’ll fuck them with our swords in their asses, and every other which way there is to be fucked. C’mon, Val, I saw you spearing two at once, and left them each with a bloody smile on their nasty kissers.” He laughed. “She-devil." 

Val shot him a disgusted look and turned back to Jon. “We can’t wait them out, we have to meet them with fire or we’ll be overrun.”

“I don’t think more will come tonight,” Jon said, suddenly sure of it. “We’ll keep a strong guard and post a watch atop the Wall at dawn tomorrow.” He stepped into the Nightfort’s kitchens, pulling off his soaked gloves.

“But-” she started.

“Val,” he said, “no more will come tonight.”

“You can’t be sure of that!” she cried, and Clegane looked at him oddly. “They could be massing on the other side, crawling one by one through a breach not a mile from here!”

“Are we to meet them in the dead of night?” Jon asked her. “You said yourself we cannot see beyond the Wall until tomorrow-”

“My lord,” a voice interrupted him hesitantly. He turned to find Satin behind him, lightly bouncing on the balls of his feet. “I found something, my lord. A passage beneath the Wall.”

“The Black Gate!” Tormund crowed. “I knew it.”

Jon raised his eyebrows at him and turned back to Satin. “Where?” he asked. “It’s likely blocked-”

“It’s not,” Satin said, eyes wide. “I went through. I’ll show you.”

He led them to a crumbling well in the center of the kitchens and hoisted a leg over the lip. “Here?” Val asked, surprised. Satin nodded and crawled the rest of the way over.

“The chain broke,” he explained, as they filed down the narrow stair behind him, “so I climbed down to retrieve the bucket.” His voice echoed strangely, winding around and around the hollow tunnel back up to the surface.

“I would’ve never thought to look here-” Val started softly.

“O’course not,” Tormund said heartily. “All manner of things out of place at the Nightfort.”

“Might be the Rat King himself climbed down these stairs,” Satin piped up.

“Or the Night’s King-” Tormund agreed, turning back to look at Jon.

“Or brave Danny Flint,” Jon said. Clegane’s armor clinked behind him, reverberating oddly around the wet stone wall.

They reached the bottom and edged along a black pool, backs against the dripping concave stone. When Satin ducked into a crevice, Jon grasped his wrist.

“We didn’t bring torches,” he protested. “We won’t be able to see.”

“We won’t need them,” Satin responded. “Trust me.”

Jon ducked obediently into the rocky tunnel behind the boy and felt his way around a wet bend, jarring his knee in the process. A soft white glow beamed from the other side.

He stepped outside the tunnel’s lip and came nose-to-nose with a wrinkled old visage carved amidst roots and crevices in a bright white weirwood door. The others slid out the tunnel after them, Tormund and Clegane grunting, Val as easily as a ghost. They crowded together in front of the wrinkled face, the weirwood’s gray glow dancing on their cheeks.

“Ugly old dog,” Tormund said.

“What now?” asked Val.

Satin stepped forward and placed his hand on the weirwood’s gnarled cheek. Its eyes opened, milky white. “ _Who are you?_ ” the face croaked.

“I am the sword in the darkness,” Satin answered solemnly. “I am the watcher on the walls. I am the fire that burns against the cold, the light that brings the dawn, the horn-”

“ _That will do_ ,” the face said wearily. Its eyes slid to Jon, its lips setting into a cold, stern line.

“Incredible,” Val breathed, staring at the door.

“Yes,” Jon agreed, “but it’s still closed.”

“What are you on about?” Tormund grunted at him. “The boy just opened it.”

Jon turned to look at him, then back to the door. The face regarded him with cold, blind eyes.

“Shall we go?” Satin asked. Jon stared at him, confused, but motioned him forward. The boy stepped up to the door and, before Jon could blink, he was gone.

“Satin?” Jon called, disturbed. “Where did he go?” he demanded, turning to the others. They squinted at him.

“Where did he go?” Jon turned back to the gnarled door and slammed his palm upon the wood. “Satin!”

“Jon, he’s just there-” Val motioned at the weirwood lips, set in a hard line before him. She stepped up to the door, and then she was gone too, disappeared, sucked into some void where Jon could not reach her.

“Val!” he shouted. He slapped the door with both hands, his heart pounding more painfully than it had all night.

“My lord-” Suddenly Satin stood at his side again, peering at him with wide eyes. “Say the words, my lord, and it will open for you.”

Jon took a step back and forced a shallow breath. He closed his eyes, trying to remember the night he kneeled in a snowy circle of weirwoods, and saw wights parting before him like water around a ship’s prow.

His eyes snapped open. “I’m the sword in the darkness,” he said quickly, the words spilling awkwardly from his lips. “I’m the watcher on the walls, the fire that burns against the cold, the light that brings-”

The face closed its eyes and remained barred to him. Jon stared up at it, pulse throbbing in his temple.

“I’m-” he started, his breath ragged. “I’m the sword in the darkness,” he insisted. “I am the fire that burns against the cold, the shield that-” he felt bile rising in his throat and swallowed it down painfully. “I’m the shield that- I’m the goddamn Lord Commander!” he yelled, slamming his fist against the cold wood. “I’m the watcher on the walls, and the Wall is mine!” he kicked savagely at the door, his foot bouncing off thick roots. “Let me pass!” he screamed. “I’m Lord Commander, let me pass!”

“Jon-” a voice rasped in his ear, and a warm hand clutched his cloak at the nape of his neck. He stumbled backward on the uneven floor, steps slipping as Clegane pulled him through the tunnel and past the deep black pool.

“Can’t lose yourself like that, boy,” Clegane grunted down at him, thick fingers clasped around his shoulder as he steered him up the stair. “It’s not something you want others to see.”

“Fuck you,” Jon spat. He trembled from head to foot, his heart pounding so rapidly he felt it driving him out of his body, lifting him up above the top of his skull to look down upon the spiraling stair, the cold black water below them bottomless and inviting.

_My heart is thumping_ , Jon thought bitterly, _my blood flowing, my lungs pulling breath. If it’s not my body that’s dead, it must be me._

Clegane said something, but the words bounced like pebbles off a stone roof to gather in piles at Jon’s feet, and he stepped over them, heedless, until the wall grew so high he was forced back in his body, and he glared up at Clegane as the words took shape in his ear.

“Don’t forget who you are,” Clegane urged him. “The world can’t change that unless you let them.”

“Don’t you mean _what_ I am?" Jon snarled.

Clegane only looked down at him, so Jon brushed past and climbed over the well’s lip to stand once again in the Nightfort’s kitchens. He stood still a few moments, blood pounding in his ears.

He looked up to see Melisandre hurrying toward him from the outer door.

“What is it?” he snapped.

“The fires have shown me something,” she said, copper tangles sticking to her wet, red lips.

“What?” he asked again, resting his palm against the hilt of his sword.

“Shapes along the Wall,” she said. “Moving toward us. They’re close, Jon, and coming closer.”

“Where?” he asked, taking long strides toward the open door, the cold black night waiting on the other side.

“From the east,” she said, falling into step just behind him.

Outside, Jon shouted for an escort and ran to the stables. He mounted Tormund’s gray gelding and rode to the night fires burning beneath the Wall.

“Torches,” he snapped at Melisandre’s sorry followers. He turned back to find Sandor Clegane astride his wild black courser, Melisandre behind him on a sturdy roan. “You’ll take a torch,” he said to Clegane.

“Like hell I will,” he snarled back. Jon shrugged.

Fifty wildlings gathered behind him within ten minutes, almost half ahorse and all with torches burning in their hands- all but one, Jon mused, side-eyeing Clegane where he cantered alongside him. They surged past the Nightfort’s eastern edge and moved briskly along the Wall, flames burning a bright yellow ring against the impenetrable black night.

A voice from the front shouted. “I saw something!”

“Where?” another called back.

“Just there!” a woman cried. “Moving up ahead!”

Their yells whipped the group into a frenzy, and the front line of wildlings ran forward, the horsed among them keeping pace with the others.

_He_ heard a panicked cry through the night. “ _Wait_ \- Jon Snow! We’ve come for _Jon Snow_!”

The wildlings formed a circle of light around the trespassers, waving their torches menacingly. Jon rode into the circle and looked upon the newcomers.

They were a sorry lot, but these at least were alive. Two young, dark-haired women sharing a horse sat next to a grizzled-looking gray-haired matriarch, two men behind them. All were bruised and bloody, their hair matted, cloaks torn and dripping with snow. The girl seated at the front of the saddle swayed dangerously to one side before the other woman yanked her back atop the horse. She glared when she saw Jon watching, a bloody stream flowing from her nose down her chin. The two men sported scrapes and split lips, one cradling his arm against his torso.

“Who are you?” Jon asked.

“I believe you knew my brother,” the gray-haired woman nudged her horse forward and looked Jon up and down. She alone of the small group appeared none the worse for wear, her ring mail reflecting yellow flickers, a spiked mace slung across her back.

“Lady Maege,” he nodded courteously. “What has happened to your party?”

“We were attacked by- by dead things in the night,” she growled. “Bastards nearly ripped off my Jory’s leg. I beg you, she needs help, or she won’t make it to morning.”

Jon felt a warm flutter by his arm as Melisandre pulled her horse forward. She trotted up to the girls and leaned close. Jon heard a low flow of words uttered between them, but couldn’t make out what was said.

“I heard a shout that you had come for me,” Jon said, turning back to Maege Mormont.

“Yes,” she nodded, “I’ve news to share with you. Might we speak indoors-”

Jon shook his head, sick at the thought of returning to the kitchens. “Tell me now.”

“My Jory should rest,” she protested, but Melisandre straightened and wheeled her horse around.

“She is healed,” she announced and pulled up shoulder-to-shoulder with Jon.

Lady Mormont turned and examined her daughter’s leg. “Gods,” she muttered and gazed at Melisandre, features swirling with shock and exhaustion in the flickering light.

“Tell me your news,” Jon said again. Lady Maege stared at Melisandre a moment longer, then pulled herself up to look Jon square in the face.

“I’ve been to White Harbor,” she announced. “Lord Wyman rode to Winterfell more than four months ago, and White Harbor had as yet received no word from him when I left. He built up a small navy, which I’ve seen with my own eyes. White Harbor is clamoring to march on Winterfell. We’ve heard rumors of battles at the Wall- wildling armies-” her eyes flicked to the torchbearers surrounding her. “White Harbor would stand behind you, Jon Snow.”

“Stand behind me?” Jon repeated, though he was thinking on a fleet of ships- a navy- and a failed mission from months ago-

“I rode with your brother Robb from Riverrun,” she continued, and Jon’s attention snapped back. “We parted at Hag’s Mire before crossing the Twins, for he set me on another mission, a delicate matter that he felt was of utmost importance. It hurts me to the very core that he turned out to be right, it does.”

“And what matter was that?” Jon asked, his heart pumping a painful staccato.

“His last will and testament,” she answered and pulled a black velvet drawstring pouch from deep within her armor. She untied the strings and tapped a yellow scroll from the bag into her palm. “He named you heir to his kingdom,” she said and placed the document into his outstretched fingers, “Your Grace.”

Jon felt Melisandre’s eyes on him while the wildlings glared down the newcomers and Sandor Clegane shifted on his courser. Jon broke the seal and unfurled the document bearing Robb’s last words.

_I, Robb Stark, King in the North_ _,_ it began, but Jon’s eyes caught on the part that said “ _Robb Stark_ ” and he found that the rest of the words made no sense to him. His gaze consumed Robb’s writing, and he saw his brother as he was the day Jon rode north to the Wall, only his face was lined with weariness, his eyes bright with anxiety, a heavy gold crown slipping low on his forehead. The image was followed by another just as starkly clear, that of a horde of wights spilling endlessly down a hill, their steps ragged and jerky, their maws clicking grotesquely, and of Jon walking where they parted around him, his sword burning so hot it hurt his eyes. He saw ships with black sails, snow on fire, a crown of blood and bone, and he felt the puzzle pieces of the world sliding into place around him.

“Would you march on Winterfell?” Maege Mormont asked him. “Would you reclaim your family home as King in the North?”

“We’ll go to White Harbor,” Jon decided, still staring at the small piece of paper.

“White Harbor today,” Lady Mormont smiled, “and then, Winterfell?”

“White Harbor today,” Jon returned, “and then, Hardhome.”

Even Melisandre turned to him, surprised. An angry swell of invectives broke from the wildlings, and Mormont’s party gazed at him, horrified.

“You know there won’t be anyone to find at Hardhome but what attacked us today,” Sandor Clegane growled. “There can’t be anything beyond the Wall but the dead, Jon!”

“Yes,” Jon said, a strange smile curling his lips as he held up Robb’s Last Will and Testament, “and I’m the Dead King.”


	10. Sansa V

Sansa was still shivering when she first saw the whitewashed buildings and cobbled streets of White Harbor.

Her shoulders ached and she was chilled to the bone. She couldn’t walk more than five steps without trembling and kept her arms wrapped tightly around her middle. Maester Colemon hovered anxiously at her side. It had not been ten hours since one of Ser Marlon’s men fished her out, crooking his arm around her waist while he held tightly to a thick coil of rope, ten men digging their heels in on the other end to hoist them aboard.

Sansa had difficulty breathing at first, the ship swimming before her eyes. Every breath was a cold, sharp needle in her chest. She lifted her hand to her temple and her fingers came back covered in sticky red blood. A sudden stab in the fingers of her left hand made her cry out. When she raised her arm, she found she could not bend the middle three fingers, and the itching underneath the skin was so intense she curled her shaking body around the hand, trying to hold back tears.

“Gods, you can’t stay out of trouble for ten minutes?” a voice hissed in her ear. Lady Dustin yanked her to her feet, and the gust of icy wind flapping the ship’s sails was so painful against her sodden, frozen body that she cried out again. “Come, girl,” the woman ordered as she dragged her away from the railing. “You can’t stay here and freeze. I’m taking you to my cabin to dry off.”

She thought of fur blankets and a crackling fire and followed Lady Dustin toward the stairs.

“Wait,” Sansa stopped and turned. “Ser!” she called at the small group of men still gathered at the spot where the broken jib had toppled her overboard. The man who had saved her was as sopping wet as she, and though he pushed at the jib with the other men to secure it against the railing, shivers racked his wiry shoulders every few moments. “Thank you, ser!” she called again. The man caught her eye and nodded quickly, the other sailors turning to regard her as well. “I owe all of you a debt,” she continued. A few smiled, one snorted and turned back to the jib, others just stared at her. She felt Lady Dustin’s grip on her arm again and allowed herself to be pulled down below deck.

“Good,” Lady Dustin muttered as they hurried down the steps. “You acknowledged them and gave them a few more seconds to look at you in your wet dress. Your nipples are hard,” she commented.

“My lady!” Sansa gasped, raising her arms to cover herself.

“Girl, you know you’re beautiful,” Lady Dustin snickered, “so why are you so embarrassed about it?”

“It’s not proper, the way you talk about it,” Sansa responded with as much dignity as she could muster between shivers. “Besides,” she said, glancing at Lady Dustin surreptitiously, “I’m sure they weren’t looking at me like _that_. They just saved my life! They were _noble_. They might have lost their friend, or fallen overboard themselves! They wouldn’t be thinking about me in that way!”

“Sansa,” Lady Dustin shook her head and led her down the short, tight corridor to her cabin door. “A man can save a baby from a burning building and place the child gently in your arms, kneeling humbly, as noble as you please, and all the while be thinking of every depraved thing he’d like to do to you if you were naked.” She swung the door open and moved to light a large lamp beside her bed.

Sansa didn’t know what to say to that. She stood shivering, holding her burning fingers to the feeble warmth of the lamp’s small flame. She ran her fingertips over the palm of her right hand repeatedly, trying to determine if feeling still remained in them.

When the ship passed through the Outer Harbor, Sansa stood again at the prow, dry and bundled in layers of furs. She clutched the railing, ignored the darkening color in the fingertips of her left hand, and counted at least twenty war galleys. They passed a great white steeple thrusting up almost fifty feet from rippling black waters. Ser Marlon raised an arm at the small group of archers positioned at the top. They lifted their bows in greeting, and Sansa watched half of them disappear from their post, only to reappear again, scrambling down the stone steps carved into the steeple’s side, circling around and around until they reached a rickety-looking rope bridge spanning a hundred feet to the city’s primary trade harbor. They were not even halfway down by the time the ship passed through the Inner Harbor, Bronze Yohn’s three galleys and the Manderlys’ two following close behind.

The Inner Harbor was clogged with ships. Thirty more war galleys were docked there. Sansa saw men running up and down the decks like ants, another fifty or so smaller vessels docked all around them. Men and women were strolling along the harbor’s edge, merchants and traders haggling in brightly colored tents, while salty winds blew through their wares, fluttering the rich reds and blues of the women’s dresses, the dark green of healthy firs and pines growing up to the stony bay, tilting gently in the breeze. Sansa watched the ripple of recognition as men and women walking along the coast, merchants and traders stationed at the water’s edge, all turned and watched their approach. She gripped the railing and stood tall, willing away the tremors down her spine as strands of hair blew on her face, flickering like bright red ribbons.

“My lady,” Maester Colemon stepped up next to her at the railing. “You should let me wrap that gash.” He pushed back a lock of hair over her right shoulder and exposed to the bite of cold, salty winds the long cut stretching from her temple to her earlobe. She hissed and pulled her head away from him, her bright red hair covering the laceration.

“I cannot very well walk into White Harbor with a scarf around my head,” she said through clenched teeth, fighting against building irritation. “It’s bad enough those men had to put down their work to save me last night. I will not walk into New Castle before the men of the Vale and White Harbor looking like an invalid.”

“The cut won’t knit properly if it is not wrapped, my lady,” he protested. “I fear it will harden and grow black.”

Sansa wrapped her left hand further around the underside of the railing, hiding her fingertips from his view. “My hair covers it,” she said, looking away from him and back to the mainland. They had begun to dock. Sailors scurried over the edge to prepare the arrival of the remaining five ships, while a giant anchor was heaved over the stern. “No one will ever see it.”

“Lady Sansa,” Maester Colemon protested, moving closer to her side once more, “if you do not let me cover it-”

"I will not let you cover it,” she interrupted. “I have already told you that I will not. Will you make me say it again? Will you listen to my wishes and trust my judgment?” She took a deliberate step to the side, establishing a distance between them. “I wish for you to look after my cousin, and not to speak to me on this subject any more. Will you do that for me, Maester Colemon?”

He stepped back, looking at her toes, and nodded quickly before hurrying away. She sighed and looked back to the mainland. A line of soldiers had approached, waiting to escort them into White Harbor. Highborn men and women clustered a few steps behind them, leaning close to whisper together before standing again on tip-toes to see above the soldiers’ heads. Young girls and boys, not so well-bred, were scurrying around the lords and ladies, darting between gaps in the line of soldiers before they were yelled at to go away, climbing mid-sized pines set a bit further back from the water’s edge to get a better view. Sansa saw a little dark-haired thing scramble to an upper branch in a young pine and settle herself down, legs swinging. Their eyes met, the girl’s dark gaze widening when Sansa lifted her hand in greeting. She waved back frantically, and the sudden recollection of Arya sitting high above her in a frost-covered hemlock, taunting her into a rage, made Sansa chuckle to herself.

“My lady,” she heard a rough voice behind her. Sansa turned to find her cousin bundled up in two thick furs with his falcon-and-moon cloak fastened over them, laying in the arms of a tall, wiry man with dark peppered hair and whiskers.

“Ser Bryen,” she greeted Lady Dustin’s shield, though he was not a knight in the Southern tradition. “Ser Derek,” she nodded at the shorter and burlier man next to him, who was digging his heels in while the dog at the end of the leash paced restlessly, putting a nose over the railing to see if he could jump to shore. Robert shifted and sat up in Ser Bryen’s arms.

“I can walk,” he said groggily, blinking in the white overcast light. He placed small hands on the man’s shoulders to steady himself.

“Lord Robert,” Sansa said formally, “if you are ill or dizzy, best make use of Ser Bryen’s arms without complaint.”

“I wasn’t complaining,” he started to protest as Bryen set him carefully on his feet. Robert held onto Bryen’s arm for an extra second as he caught his balance, then stood up straight and glared at Sansa.

“I know you weren’t,” she responded mildly. “How are you feeling, my lord?” 

He shrugged. “Just my arm hurts,” he said. “I can’t wait to get off this boat and sleep in a real bed again.”

She smiled at him as Ser Marlon approached with Lady Dustin. “Soon, my lord,” she said, and he nodded tiredly.

“Lady Sansa,” Lady Barbrey called out, striding ahead of Ser Marlon. “They’ve lowered the steps and asked that you disembark first. They’re waiting for you.”

Sansa held out her arm to Ser Marlon when he reached her side and led the army she had helped rouse off the ship and into White Harbor.

The city was white, clean and cold. Dark green pines lined the cobbled streets, the white stone buildings imposing and impressive. Ser Marlon greeted the commander of the White Harbor guard and introduced him as Ser William Snow, New Castle’s master-of-arms and de facto commander of the garrison while Ser Marlon was away.

“Ser William,” he said, “it is Lady Sansa Stark, come to retake Winterfell with an army behind her.”

She put her hand on Ser Marlon’s arm and stepped forward with a small, graceful courtesy. “Lady Sansa Stark Lannister,” she corrected him lightly, “come home to put the North to rights.”

Ser William was a young man of a height with her. His dark hair glinted redly in the slowly-appearing sunlight. Sansa felt a painful stab as she remembered Robb under the arched gate of Winterfell. “Shall we ride now to New Castle, my lady? Perhaps you may find more soldiers to join your army along the way.”

She turned to watch the men dismounting the ships behind them. “Let us walk to the top of this hill, Ser William,” she said. “I would wait for my men. Where are they to camp before we set out?”

“We will house a third of them within New Castle,” Ser Marlon said as they set out up the hill. “Those remaining may camp on the northern banks of the city near the Knife.” He glanced sideways at her. “We will ride out from there when the time comes to leave for Winterfell.”

“You will lead the White Harbor garrison, Ser Marlon?” she asked. He nodded gravely. “You mustn’t leave White Harbor unprotected. What force do you leave behind?”

“White Harbor is manned by one thousand shields, my lady,” Ser William cut in. “And more than fifty ships, as no doubt you noticed sailing through the harbors.”

“Yes,” she replied wonderingly. “Who ordered the construction of such a navy?”

“It was Lord Manderly,” Ser Marlon answered. “We began building the ships three years ago. They are intended for warfare.”

“Against whom?” she asked. “Do you fear Braavosi pirates?”

“Against the Lannisters, of course,” Ser William said impatiently. “Against the Iron Throne, who would have us kneel to skin-flayers.”

Sansa regarded him curiously. “My good family is all but broken,” she told him. “They have no power in ships, and their allies that do are fighting amongst themselves just now, contriving to replace them.” They reached the top of the hill and Sansa turned to watch the swarm of men and horses massing below. A cold wind snapped through her white cloak.

“Ser Marlon,” she said, “with whom does White Harbor trade?”

The man tilted his head as he scanned the docks. Brightly colored sails trimmed the peripheries, while more modestly-adorned boats took up the middle spots. “Braavos and the Vale,” he answered. “We receive many Pentoshi and Tyroshi here, as well. Boats from further north make their way occasionally, especially from Karhold, and it is not too difficult a trek from the Riverlands if passage is clear. One must travel through-” he paused and looked at her.

“The Twins,” she nodded.

“Yes,” he answered and bowed his head. Ser William spat on the ground, and they were silent, watching the army form below them.

Lady Dustin joined them not long after. Lord Robert clung to Bryen’s hand as they staggered up behind her. “Sansa, will we be riding into the city?” he panted when he reached her. “Can we leave for New Castle now?”

Sansa glanced down at her small cousin. His face and eyes were bright, though he held his arm stiffly and grimaced when he rolled his shoulder. “We are going to walk to New Castle, Lord Robert, and lead the men to their camp outside the city,” she said. “Good Lord Robert needs a long walk, does he not?” Robert’s face broke into a weary smile when he looked at Good Lord Robert, who sniffed at the wind and wagged his tail frantically.

Almost all the men had disembarked onto shore. Ser Marlon stepped forward and raised his hand.

“Men of the Vale, we welcome you to White Harbor!” he shouted. “Men of White Harbor, we welcome you home!” Another gust of wind rattled Sansa’s teeth, and she clutched her arms around her waist to keep from shaking. Movement at the water’s edge continued as horses were lined up and baggage trains rounded together. “It is our great honor,” Ser Marlon shouted over the whistling winds, “to escort Lady Sansa Stark back to the North and to Winterfell!” A cheer went up within the troops. Sansa watched as the men looked at her, grinning and commenting amongst themselves. Sansa glanced down and met Lady Dustin’s eyes. She remembered what Barbrey had said about men the prior evening and suppressed a giggle. She looked back to the army waiting at the base of the hill and stepped forward.

“Men of the Vale!” she called and lifted her hand. “My fierce Runestone men,” she nodded at the largest group, gathered at the mass’s center, Bronze Yohn’s heavy armor unmistakable at the front of the line. “Noble Ironoaks soldiers,” Anya Waynwood had not joined her forces Northward, nor had Ser Harry, but the mass of dark green to the left of Bronze Yohn’s army numbered more than one thousand, and they let out a cheer when she called to them. “My honorable Knight of Ninestars, and his brave Templeton army! My soldiers of Strongsong, Gulltown, Heart’s Home, and the Gates of the Moon! The North is blessed in its friends!” Her gaze swept over the men gathered in front of her to the lords and ladies, the merchants and street children listening at the edges.

“I am Lady Sansa Stark Lannister. Lord Robert Arryn is my cousin, and together, we have seen first-hand the strength of the East. When spring comes again, the Vale will be healthy, whole and _strong_ , and you will always find a friend in the North! We will never try to conquer you or tell you how to rule, not that we could if we tried!” She heard chuckles, a few grunts of agreement. “The North wants open trade for mutual benefit, military presence to make the roads between us safe again, and an alliance against those southern kingdoms that would impose themselves on us from afar.” She spread her hands wide and tossed her hair behind her shoulder. “They put their name on me against my will, but they cannot make me one of them! We need no Lannisters in the Vale! We need no Lannisters in the North!” They jeered, thrusting their swords in the air and stomping their feet. Sansa turned and took Ser Marlon’s arm, the direwolf on her back fluttering in the cold breeze. Ser William hurried to her left as they approached the great bridge into the main city.

“You have them cursing your husband’s family, my lady, after reminding them you have become a Lannister yourself,” he said in her ear. She heard the question in his observation.

“They did not need reminding, Ser,” she told him. “And so long as I must continue to wear the name, I will not let anyone forget.”

He looked at her curiously. “Your speech will cause a stir from White Harbor to King’s Landing. There are Freys in the city who will not take kindly to your denouncement of the ruling family.”

“Ser William,” she snorted, “I was a hostage for two years in King’s Landing. I flowered and became a woman as a hostage. I was forced to marry and become a wife as a hostage.” Sansa flicked him a quick look, Ser Marlon’s silent presence at her right a show of stoic support. “You know as well as I that any Freys still in this city were no longer guests the moment we docked in your harbor.” They stepped onto the bridge, and Sansa turned to watch the first lines of soldiers spill over the hill behind them. “I want them rounded up, Ser William, all of them kept under guard at New Castle with us.”

“The Wolf’s Den generally serves as our prison, Lady Sansa.”

“They’re not prisoners, they’re hostages,” she laughed. “I’m sure they will appreciate the large difference. Bastards, too,” she glanced at him appraisingly. “I knew my brother Jon well enough to know it makes no matter if his name is Rivers or Snow, so long as he is raised with family, a man is still his father’s son.”

Ser William Snow met her gaze. “Not all bastards are raised by their fathers.”

“No, but what colors do they fight under?” she asked.

He blinked. She glanced at the blue-green cloak of the White Harbor garrison draped over his shoulders. “The colors of their true lord or lady, I suppose.”

“Yes, and we all know what a true lord Walder Frey is to his endless progeny,” she said. “I want them held under guard within the hour, Ser William.” Another hundred men of the garrison met them at the other side of the bridge, four riderless horses among them. Ser William mounted a tall white stallion and nodded down at her.

“I will carry this out, my lady,” he said seriously. “Would you take a horse for your travel today?” He gestured to a stout roan mare. Sansa looked at it uncertainly. She was so stiff from cold she feared she wouldn’t be able to hold her seat on a horse.

“Lord Robert,” she said, turning to find her cousin at Bryen’s side, “are you tired?”

“I can walk,” he said bravely.

“Of course you can,” she said, approaching the mare and beckoning him forward, “but I would have you ride with me, my lord.”

Robert narrowed his eyes at her. “I can ride by myself!” he protested.

“But Ser Marlon needs a horse,” she turned back to the group, “and Lady Dustin.” She caught the woman’s eye and glared at her. Barbrey raised her eyebrows but remained silent. “Come, my lord,” she held her hand out to him. “We’ll ride double to see the soldiers to camp.”

They parted ways with the city garrison and followed Ser Marlon’s lead through White Harbor. Sansa clutched her arm around Robert’s middle and whispered in his ear.

“I need you to be strong for me, Lord Robert,” she said. “I am so tired I fear I may faint and fall off this horse.”

He looked over his shoulder at her in surprise. “You don’t seem tired,” he said. “You talked to all those men... You seemed very strong.”

“I am glad to hear you say so,” she said. “All I want right now is a hot bath and a warm bed. I think I could sleep for two days at least. But we must leave the city soon, Robert. Roose Bolton will hear of our approach, and we can’t give him too much time to flee.”

“What will you do with him and his soldiers when we get to Winterfell, Sansa? What will you do with the Freys in White Harbor?” Sansa was more than a little unnerved that Robert had overheard her conversation with Ser William.

“Any who would join our force will be welcomed,” she decided. “All others must remain hostages, at least until our position is secure.”

“I don’t think your soldiers will like that very much,” Robert said quietly. They were circling the fields just north of the city where her men would camp. Horses and baggage trains spilled over the hills while men hastily raised small tents. Ser Marlon and Bronze Yohn Royce, stationed atop their tall coursers, were speaking seriously across the field by four crude stables. Everywhere she looked, Sansa saw the cold glint of steel and armor. “I think your soldiers would prefer blood.”

Sansa took the reins from Robert’s hands and turned the mare’s nose into the crowd. They cut across the field, passing through the mass of soldiers. Men called out to her, and she raised her hand and called back. At the center of the field, a large tent was spread out, several supply carts of food and ale waiting around the periphery. Sansa pulled up, and she and Robert watched as stakes were pounded deep into the hard soil. Six men raised a solid wood beam fifteen feet tall at the middle. The tent was up within seconds, and the carts pulled inside as crude chairs and tables appeared from somewhere.

“M’lady! M’lord!” she heard. “Would you have some bread or a cup of soup?” A man had pulled his cart to the tent’s edge and was looking up at them, wiping his hands on a cloth at his waist. Others turned at the call and shouted their own encouragements, urging them to stay for an early dinner.

“Sers!” she returned with a smile. “We cannot stay long. We must be on to New Castle, but eat well tonight, for we continue on soon.”

“A drink, then!” the cook shouted. “A toast to m’lord and m’lady, back in the North again!”

She considered him. “A drink,” she agreed. They cheered and clustered around the cart, steel cups passed around while two men staggered beneath the weight of a large cask. The cups were filled quickly, and when one was placed in her hand, Sansa raised it to her nose and pulled a face.

“Ale? What, my army does not travel with wine?” she exclaimed, and the cook laughed heartily. She raised the cup in the air, and the men did the same, steel clinking underneath the cold white sky. “To Winterfell!” she called.

“To Winterfell!” they responded, and they all tipped back their heads and drank the cold, bitter ale. Sansa felt quick tendrils of warmth dripping down her tummy, but she didn’t appreciate the taste, so she passed the cup to Robert. He drank it down in one long gulp and paused, rolling his tongue in his mouth thoughtfully.

“I like it!” he decided, and the soldiers cheered and tried to refill his cup. Sansa laughed but reproached them, handing back the cup and turning the mare again to continue toward Ser Marlon.

It was another two hours before the remainder of the men were settled in New Castle, and after all the ribbing and talking, waiting with Ser Marlon as rooms were divvied up and tasks assigned to servants and soldiers alike, Sansa found herself wishing she had stayed under the tent to drink ale and eat soup. She had sent Robert with Lady Dustin to prepare for dinner and asked Maester Colemon to give him thirty minutes before checking on his stitches. She envied Robert his hot bath and wondered how badly tangled her hair was, full of sea salt and wind. She brushed her hand down her matted locks and swayed, the hall blurring before her eyes. Sansa caught her balance and blinked rapidly, but Ser Marlon did not appear to have noticed.

Another twenty minutes or so passed dully, and Sansa seemed to watch herself answering queries from afar. She felt as though she were under water again, a great pressure clogging her ears and sinuses. Her temple throbbed where the jib had hit her, and she knew she needed to lay down soon. She heard scrabbling on the stone floor and turned unsteadily to find Robert clutching Good Lord Robert’s leash. Maester Colemon, Barbrey Dustin and her shields stood in the hallway behind them.

“You are ready?” she asked dazedly. Robert nodded. “Ser Marlon,” she turned to him, taking his arm, “shall we?” They started down the hall and turned into a wide corridor, where mermen holding sconces were etched grandly into the white stone walls. Sansa clutched Ser Marlon’s arm close and hoped she could remain standing throughout the proceedings. “This should not take long,” she observed to Ser Marlon, a hint of command in her comment.

“Not long,” he agreed. “Lord Wylis wants to introduce you to our family and other guests you may find interesting, my lady.” He smiled down at her, eyes twinkling. Sansa groaned inwardly at the thought of making further conversation with strangers, though she knew she would be wise to build alliances. They entered the Merman’s Court, and she breathed deeply, scanning the row of men, women and children waiting for her on the dais. There were less than fifteen people present, for which Sansa was grateful. The servants were busy with the large addition to the castle’s inhabitants, and Sansa reckoned the remainder of their court was under lock and guard at her command.

“Lady Sansa Stark,” said the fat man with sagging jowls in the great seat at the center of the dais, “Lord Robert Arryn.” He lumbered painfully to his feet and spread his hands wide in welcome. “I am honored to receive you at White Harbor in my father’s place.”

Sansa swept into a courtesy and pulled Robert forward to bow awkwardly. “Ser Wylis,” she said, “we are overwhelmed by your graciousness, struck by the beauty of your city and your lands. I thank you for your support as Lord Robert and I return to take Winterfell from Roose Bolton. Winterfell and the Vale will always know White Harbor to be a true friend and strong brother.” Ser Wylis tipped his head, pleased with her flatteries.

“My wife, Leona,” he said, and the plump woman stepped forward with wide eyes. “My daughters, Wynafryd and Wylla.” Sansa caught their eyes and tried to smile graciously, but the room started to spin, their faces blurring into one. Ser Wylis continued his introductions as nieces, cousins, captains and a maester stepped forward. Sansa remained on her feet with great internal struggle, but feared she must seem very stupid indeed, bobbing her head and babbling pleasantries to each in turn. She thought she saw a black shadow prowling along the edge of the great hall, but when she turned, the shadows were still and Sansa desired more than ever to lay down and sleep.

“Lady Sansa,” Ser Wylis called out, “Ser Davos Seaworth, who serves as Hand to King Stannis, returned to White Harbor only days before yourself.” The man stepped forward, thin but wiry, with wispy straw-colored hair and light brown eyes that studied her as he bowed gracefully. “And the boy Ser Davos found on the island of Skagos, Lord Rickon Stark.”

Sansa heard a ragged gasp as her head snapped up to stare at the boy approaching her. Stormy blue eyes regarded her mulishly. He looked of a height and size with Lord Robert. There was a familiar red glint in his hair.

“ _Rickon_?” she asked stupidly. She heard more gasps from the women on the dais and turned to see a great black shadow stalking toward them, yellow eyes unblinking. He was three times bigger than Lady had been the last time Sansa had seen her, and he towered over the boy’s shoulder. “Shaggydog,” she whispered, and the room blurred again, a warm moisture in her eyes.

“Who is that?” the boy asked, looking behind her. She turned and saw that he was staring at Robert, holding onto Good Lord Robert’s leash. The dog was still for once, staring at the great direwolf in frozen fascination, his tail between his legs. Robert looked down at the dog and back to the boy. He cleared his throat uncertainly.

“This is my dog, Good Lord Robert,” he said, and Sansa was pleased at the spine she heard in his tone. He stepped forward, pulling the dog with him, though the pup strained at the leash. “He is almost a year old now. Sansa gave him to me as a present.”

“You named your dog after yourself?” Rickon asked incredulously. He looked at Shaggydog and squinted. “Why didn’t I think of that?” Shaggydog pawed forward, and Robert stopped abruptly.

“What is he doing?” he asked, voice suddenly a bit higher than before. The direwolf sniffed him uninterestedly, then turned to the much smaller dog and snapped threateningly. The dog crouched submissively, a spray of urine trickling onto the floor. “He’s scaring him!” Robert exclaimed. “Make him stop!”

The wolf bumped his nose against Good Lord Robert’s ear, and the dog turned belly-up, licking the wolf’s mouth experimentally. Shaggydog stepped over him and turned his head from Rickon to Robert, panting proudly.

Rickon grinned. He held out his hand to her cousin, and Robert grasped it slowly. They smiled at each other, and the smile was so bright it hurt Sansa’s eyes. She felt a sharp pain in her chest, but willed herself to remain upright, watching her brother shake hands with her cousin. She felt like laughing, and she felt like crying. She felt like living, and she felt like dying, and it was too much, the room blurred and darkened as her eyes grew warm and her chest ached. Sansa heard a cry behind her before the world went dark again, and she fell into an empty space where wolves howled and leaves rustled whispers into the wind.

To her right, blue hills and gray fields rolled on and on until they met with a cold white sky far in the horizon. To her left was a line of weirwood trees, dark red leaves rippling on bony branches above her head. She turned and saw that the trees grew in a neat, straight line, and the line had no end as far as she could see, stretching north and south, a dividing line between empty fields and whatever lay on the other side.

Sansa began to walk underneath the weirwoods’ protective white fingers, keeping the line of trees to her left. She knew intuitively that so long as the trees were on her left, she walked northward. She stretched out a hand and brushed it along the smooth bark, the wood warm to her touch.

After a time, Sansa looked right and saw that it was snowing. She looked down and realized she wore no cloak or gloves, only her thin white dress. She moved closer to the weirwoods and did not feel cold.

A gray shadow stirred among a large mass of knotted roots in front of her. Sansa stopped and watched. When the wolf poked its head around the weirwood and stared at her, Sansa’s heart skipped.

“Lady?” she asked and approached slowly.

The direwolf circled the weirwood and waited for her, tail wagging. His eyes were yellow, his fur silver, and his tongue pink when it flicked out and licked her hand. “ _Summer_ ,” she breathed and knelt to bury her face in the soft fur at his neck. The wolf stood still and allowed her embrace for a brief moment, then shied away and turned another circle around the tree, looking expectantly over his shoulder at her.

Sansa stood and studied the weirwood. It was one of the biggest she had ever seen. Its roots tangled in great white waves, its wide branches spanning five trees away on either side. Bright leaves fell from its branches, swirling in little red tornadoes until they settled comfortably on the ground. Near the base of the tree was a face carved into the smooth bark, its slanted eyes dripping sticky red tears.

Summer sniffed at the face, then darted out his tongue to lap up the crimson sap. He turned again and studied her, then licked the sap once more. Sansa bent and brushed away the weirwood’s tears, coating her fingers with the thick gummy substance. She raised her hand to her mouth and tasted it experimentally.

It was sweet and clean as summer snow. Sansa turned and watched the white flakes falling to her right, coating the hills with a soft, fluffy blanket. She licked and licked the sap from her fingers, tongue darting down her forearm where it dripped in little red rivers. The taste grew smokier, subtler, and she felt a great well of hunger. When her arm was clean, she turned and saw that the direwolf had disappeared.

“Summer?” she called and stepped forward, peering into the darkness beneath the weirwood’s branches. “Summer?” she called again, leaning forward, searching, and placed her hand on the tree’s warm bark.

A sudden wave flushed through her, as luscious as honey simmering in her veins, warming and curling her extremities. She moaned and closed her eyes tight, allowing the rush to fizzle out slowly, leaving a languid looseness in her limbs, a widened space in her head where brightly colored ideas evolved slowly and connections she had never noticed before grew clear and strong.

“Sansa,” she heard, and she knew it was her brother.

“Bran!” she cried, a sob catching in her throat. “I’ve found him!”

“I know,” he said, a smile in his voice.

“Where are you?” she asked. “We’re going home, Bran, you must come home too.”

“I cannot,” he said, “not yet.”

The disappointment was a sudden stab, cold and cruel. “Why?” she asked, warm red tears oozing down her cheeks. “I can’t do this alone. You’re Lord of Winterfell now; it’s your home to win back!”

“It is not mine,” he said sadly, “but it is yours, and it is Rickon’s.”

“Where are you?” she asked again. “I’ll come find you and bring you home. We must be together again!”

“The wolves will return to Winterfell,” he said, and a low, rumbling drum thrummed in her ears. It grew deeper, vibrating through the ground beneath her feet into her blood and bones. Sansa turned without thinking, her eyes opening, her hand falling from the smooth white bark. She felt Bran’s sudden absence cold and keen, and would have turned back to the tree if not for the dark cloud thundering up the hills from the south, an onslaught as inexorable and terrifying as a roiling flood.

Hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands, they pounded northward together, fierce and determined. Their fur rippled silver, gold, black in the wind, their tongues lolled sideways out their mouths as they panted purposefully. A few tussles broke out as one would snap spiritedly at another, leaping and rolling together as the pack ran on and on. They stormed past, paying her no mind, and the wind flapped her dress against her legs.

She was entranced. Harsh little gasps escaped her open mouth when she felt something cold and wet touch her hand. She yelped and caught a glimpse of a second huge gray wolf prowling the weirwood behind her. “Lady?” Sansa asked hopefully, but it was not.

Nymeria circled the tree and came to stand in front of her, regarding her with cool yellow eyes. She was bigger even than Shaggydog, her fur matted and dirty. She bared her teeth at Sansa, snout wrinkling menacingly, and Sansa felt suddenly nervous, remembering the last time she had seen Nymeria in life. She lifted a hand uncertainly to the wolf, the hand she had just licked clean of weirwood sap, and when her fingers brushed the tip of Nymeria’s nose the wolf snapped angrily and pounced.

Sansa slammed against the tree, her head bouncing off the hard white wood. The wolf pressed her down and snarled while the pack thundered heedlessly on. Sansa’s heart pounded while humid breath washed her face.

The wolf queen dropped back to the ground and sniffed curiously at the face weeping red tears. She darted out a tongue like her brother had, lapping up the oozing sap. When Nymeria turned and touched her tongue briefly to Sansa’s hand, she saw a wide cave lit by torches, a thousand faces stretched grotesquely on the walls, a thin girl standing below them, blood dripping slowly from the ceiling to coalesce into a pool at her feet. Nymeria held her wide-eyed gaze for a moment, then turned and ran, snapping along the line of stragglers at the pack’s end.

_This is not just a dream_ , she thought.

She turned back to the weirwood and saw herself standing next to it, long red hair flowing down into a long red dress, cold wind fluttering it open at the knees. Sansa watched herself run appreciative hands over the tree’s expansive trunk, long white fingers dipping into the sticky sap, spreading it in careless strokes along the clean bark.

“They must burn,” she said. Sansa squinted suspiciously. Her voice was deeper than she remembered.

“What?” Sansa asked the other Sansa. The woman turned her head, and Sansa saw that she was not an exact reflection, but close enough to send a cold trickle of disorientation down her spine.

“I’m going to burn the weirwoods,” the woman said, and the irises of her eyes were red, too.

“Why?” Sansa asked. And then, “Who are you?”

“I am only a servant. I bring light to chase away the darkness and fire to burn out the cold.”

“You are powerful,” Sansa observed. She could feel it, jolts crackling in the still air between them.

The woman smiled, her teeth gleaming white against dark red lips. “I am,” she agreed.

“There is power in fire,” Sansa said. She spoke mechanically, the words springing to her lips without thought. “There is power in death. There is power in heat, in passion, destruction. But there is power in earth and life. There is power in wisdom, which does not burn but sustains, year after year.”

The woman narrowed her eyes. Red leaves fell on her shoulders and tangled in her long copper locks.

“Taste it,” Sansa urged her. “You’ve never tasted this before, I promise.”

“I should have known,” the woman said. “You would turn me from my path. You would have my lungs freeze and my eyes grow dim.”

“You are already blind,” Sansa returned. The fire was in her eyes, suffocating everything else in black smoke. “You should sleep,” she told her. “It would do you good.”

The woman glared at her, a sudden hot wind swirling their hair and their skirts in a whirlwind where they stood facing each other, one white and one red, while a tornado of crimson leaves circled around them.

“I didn’t come for advice,” she snapped and pointed behind Sansa. “I came to show you something.”

Sansa turned to find her brother walking toward her, dark hair and lashes coated in clean white flakes. “Jon!” she cried happily and ran out in a thick wet pile of snow to greet him. The snow slowed her steps, her limbs heavy and clumsy. He stopped and held out his hand. His mouth opened, his eyes grew wide. His torso opened like cheesecloth, dark holes steaming in the cold air, thick black drops falling slowly to punch small craters in the snow. Jon looked down, his hand covering a hole in his left side. He raised his fingers, and they were black and oily. He looked up at her bemusedly, then fell to his knees and landed face-first in the snow.

“No!” she screamed. “Not again!” She rolled him onto his back so his dark eyes stared up at the empty white sky. Sansa smelled an acrid smoke in the wind and turned to find the row of weirwood trees that stretched north and south as far as the eye could see, burning, burning in angry red flames, black smoke rising in a thick cloud to cover the empty expanse of hills and fields in shadow.

“I have to burn them,” she heard and spun to see the red woman kneeling over Jon’s head, running the tips of her fingers over his face. “It is the only way to fight the cold shadow.”

“ _You’re_ making the shadow!” Sansa cried, pointing up at the smoke while weirwoods burst and hissed.

The woman looked up at the smoke hovering over them. “I never saw it that way before,” she said softly and covered the gaping holes in Jon’s torso with her hands. Sansa wanted to throw her off but as she watched, the wounds knit back together, skin stretching smooth where holes had been moments before. He continued to look blankly at the sky above them, now clogged with smoke.

“Is he dead?” she asked.

“Yes,” the woman told her. Sansa moaned and wondered if she could make the holes inside her disappear as well. “You are right,” the red woman said. “There is power here that I have never tasted before.” She looked over Sansa’s shoulder and smiled.

The white wolf stalked silently toward them. “ _Lady_ ,” Sansa whispered a third time, but only in memoriam. He sniffed Jon’s body, licked the red woman’s hand and looked up at Sansa. When she met his gaze, she gasped.

Warm musky breath woke her suddenly. She sat up in bed and came face to face with Shaggydog’s bright yellow eyes regarding her intently. She stiffened until she saw Rickon sitting on the edge of the bed, watching her, his hand at Shaggy’s nape.

“You saw?” she asked. He nodded. “They’re alive,” she breathed wonderingly. “They’re alive,” she said again, stronger.

“They’re gone,” Rickon said. “They’re far away.”

Sansa looked at him, at the dark shadows under his cloudy blue eyes. “They don’t have anywhere to go,” she told him. “But we’re going to take back Winterfell, and we’ll give them a home to return to.”

“Yes,” he said, “and then we’ll make our enemies pay.”


	11. (Minya's Minuet) II

The kindly man leaned back in his chair.

“I believe we understand the terms of your request,” he said mildly, nodding in Arya’s direction. “Let us discuss the price.”

“Aye, that be more interesting,” the Iron Captain smirked, waggling his thick eyebrows. They looked like furry worms crawling above his ruddy nose. Arya was captivated. He caught her eye and quickly turned away, the smirk melting down his face. “We don’t have quite what Euron brought last time-”

“A different task,” the kindly man flicked his fingers. “A different price.”

“Right,” the captain fidgeted. “Well, Euron seemed to think...” he pulled out a small bundle tucked inside his furs. He turned the cloth package over in his hands a few times. He looked almost embarrassed. “He said you’d find this to your liking,” he said and pushed it across the table.

The kindly man unwrapped the string and held up an end of the dusty cloth. The package unraveled and a thin black object tumbled into his open palm. The captain’s hapless first mate leaned forward curiously.

“Whatsit?” he asked. His tongue flicked out his open mouth.

The kindly man held up a piece of polished rock. It was roughly cylindrical with a small knob at one end and a flattened lip on the other. His hand slid into a grip around the smooth black stone. Arya thought his fingers trembled.

“Yes,” the kindly man said coolly. “What _is_ it?”

“Euron said-” the captain started, then shook his head. “I don’t know. Looks a shiny bit of rock to me, but Euron said you’d think it interesting.”

“Did he?” the kindly man returned, hefting the stone with his fingers. “Said I’d do your dirty work for a half-slab of dragon glass? How am I to keep fires burning in the temple with this paltry offering?”

“Easy, now,” the captain said irritably. “I thought I’d show it to you, since Euron said- I’ve gold to pay for the job, so stop your bleating.” The coins clinked when he threw the bags on the table. The kindly man leaned forward and rapped a coin against the granite.

“Very well,” he nodded, suddenly efficient. “You’ll sail today.” Rain drizzled half-heartedly against gray windows set high in the opposite walls. The captain flicked uneasy glances at her. The first mate’s tongue swept vacantly across his cracked lips. Arya noticed that the polished piece of black rock was missing. She was supposed to say something, she remembered. What was it? Where had the dragon glass gone? She opened her mouth to speak.

The ship rocked her onto her back in a cold puddle. She hissed and rolled against the damp wall. Wood creaked around her, and the floor slid up for a weightless second before it groaned back down to the sea with a hard _thud_. Arya felt the shudder down her spine. The toothless man in the corner gurgled unhappily.

The hull was humid and cold. Her hair stuck unpleasantly in clumps on her neck and jaw. Her knees scrabbled against slick rotten wood as she pulled herself to a crouch, squinting upward at the dripping ceiling. Boots clomped and ropes thumped and voices snarled above while the ship creaked with the weight of the sea. Arya scuttled like a blind crustacean to the hatch and the toothless man rolled over to watch.

“Hehh guhl op dayhee foh hay fiee do ehdt?” he burbled.

“I can’t understand you, old man,” she said, pushing the door carefully, nose smushed flat while she scanned the upper floor for boots.

“Do ehdt!” he repeated. “Olmah, puh puh puh...”

The slice of room that she could see was clear of pacing boots, and she heard no voices. She curled her fingers about the lip on either side, her neck bent against the weight of the trap door.

“Food,” she heard insistently below her. “Fahooduh,” the old man said again, and she looked down, catching his eye.

“Alright, alright,” she said. “I’ll try and find you something to eat.”

“Do ehdt,” he sighed, sinking back into his puddle. Arya crouched, caught her breath, and jumped, wriggling her way under the heavy door into the hall above.

She had only just slid the door back into place among the floorboards when three ship boys rounded the corner.

“Whosat?” one asked, squinting down the shadows at her. Needle slid along her thigh as she straightened.

“Is ‘at you, Heldred, hiding in your conch?” the boy asked again, advancing down the hall. “Come wiv’ us. The Drumm’s at it today. Said the Drowned God’s not bein’ a bitch for once, and Marlow’s smelt dirt this morning-”

“It’s her!” one of the other boys hissed, yanking his arm.

They stopped, blocking the narrow hall, mouths agape.

“Hello,” she said, pulling her hood up and tucking her arms inside the robe. Her fingers brushed Needle’s hilt.

“What are you doing down here?” the first boy demanded. Another elbowed him in the ribs.

“Just checking the hold for curses,” she said, tilting her head strangely. “It’s good to hear your Sea God is back on our side.”

“ _Drowned_ God,” he said. “What do you mean, curses?”

“Curses,” she nodded sagely. “The God of Many Faces gives his servants the power to sniff them out-”

“Load of shit,” the boy snapped, uncomfortable. “What does Crow Eye want wiv’ you? You’re just a scrawny, ugly little rat-” he broke off as she leaned in, nose hovering a finger’s breadth from his neck. The other two boys shifted down the hall as Arya took a big, noisy whiff.

“Ugh,” she protested. “You smell like rotten boar feces!” The boy shoved her hard, and her fingers grasped for Needle’s smooth hilt before she hit the ground. The boy leapt to pin her down. Arya struggled to pull her sword free from the low neck in her tied robe, but it slid out easily in her hand even before he could pull back for the first blow. She crammed it up in line with his belly, but there was no blade to pierce his navel as she expected. She found her hand drenched in sticky red blood where his nose crunched under her fingers. She pulled back and stared at the oblong dragonglass hilt she had seen the kindly man handle in her dream. The boy screamed and spat as his friends approached warily.

She slipped the stone inside her robe and stood, wiping her bloody hand on the boy’s trousers.

“I would have killed you, but the God of Many Faces does not will it,” she told him. “Come near me again and I’ll make it his will.”

The boy merely moaned as blood bubbled through his fingers. Arya walked quickly down the hall and turned the corner toward the galley.

The men didn’t like her, but she’d been sent for and claimed from the Faceless Men, so they didn’t harass her. The cook turned his back when she stole a slimy bowl of stew and slammed a half-empty cask on the counter next to her elbow to let her know she’d overstayed her welcome. Arya spirited three hard rolls down the front of her robe and slipped up the stairs.

The ship was narrow and powerful. It sliced efficiently through the long black glass of sea. The sails snapped like leathern wings and pushed the vessel onward, toward the line where sky met sea, where Arya’s eyes could just detect a jagged break in the horizon, the contour of mountains, forests, _land_ before them.

The iron sailors gave her wide berth where she leaned against the rail and soon enough forgot she was there. Three days, the consensus seemed to be. Three days, and they’d be docked five miles up coast from White Harbor.

The wind was wet and frigid. Arya stared at the sun’s timid reflection as the cold black glass parted and rushed past. She’d been six when Rickon was born. The day had been wet like this, though not so cold. The river had been gray, not black, and her runner didn’t cut through water as aggressively as an iron ship. She pulled the river runner on shore, boots scrabbling on the icy rocks. She turned and saw the boys running ahead, their runners already stashed behind a granite boulder.

“Wait!” she called, yanking the boat in place behind Jon’s and sprinting after them. “Wait for me!” The ground was hard beneath her feet and she pumped her legs to catch up. Her nose tingled with frosted gasps, and a steady mist of rain stung her cheeks.

Robb stopped for a quick breath and looked back at her. “Come on!” he shouted, but she couldn’t see his face through the fog. “Hurry up or you’ll miss him!”

She pushed herself. She needed to hurry, or she would miss it. She would miss everything. Her chest hurt and a needle pricked between her ribs, just below her breast. She had to get there in time. She couldn’t miss it.

She jumped a shiny black root and turned the path’s corner, through the clearing in front of the sprawling farm house. Her hair stuck to her neck with sweat, and the sun beat through thick air, oppressively hot. Her sandals tripped up the porch steps, and she yanked a brass handle, heart pounding in her ears.

The door slammed shut against the midday sun, cloaking the inner foyer in cold shadows. A maid appeared at the head of a grand stair at the sound.

“Is she-” she choked, feet rooted to the floor. “Is she-”

“Come up, miss,” the maid answered, her face set as a stone. “Hurry now.”

She clutched at the smooth wooden rail and sprang up the wide stairwell, but her blood was cold with dread.

The windows were shuttered, drapes drawn closed. The air was close and somehow foul. She stepped inside and wanted to gag, the feeling intensified when she saw her father leaning over the bed and, in the corner, the strange woman he’d kept at his side since the weather turned. _Modron_. She didn’t know how long it had been since she’d first come around, but it had been hot and suffocating, the air too wet to take a deep breath.

“Why is _she_ here?” she demanded. The room was crowded with her in it.

Her father turned. Sweat dripped in the lines on his face. He caught the woman’s eye, then stood and stepped from the bed.

“Come, Minya,” he said, “Say goodbye to your mother.”

Moments passed heedlessly, one after the other, and she found herself looking down at her mother’s pale, strained face, the room empty and still. It wasn’t fair. She obeyed her father, attended her lessons, was kind to her maidservants, loved her mother. Her mother, who had been so beautiful, soft and clean.

“Please don’t,” she whispered, but it was too hot to breathe deeply, and her heart was thumping much too quickly. She pushed a breath through her pursed lips, trying to calm herself.

“Minya,” her mother whispered, opening her eyes and seeing her for the first time in months. “Do you remember our song?”

“Mama,” she said.

“Yes, you do,” her mother sighed, settling back on the pillow. “Go on, I want you to practice.”

She blinked, sitting on the edge of the bed. “Practice for what?” she asked, but her mother smiled faintly and took her hand, waiting for her to begin. Minya swallowed.

 

_The sky was big and far away,_

_The sun was hot and fierce,_

_The sea was cold and distant._

 

_One girl, she sat atop her tallest tree._

_‘I am free to roam, I have no home,’_

_Said she, ‘up here, I’m all alone._

_The sky, the sun, the sea, and me,_

_No place to be or family.’_

 

Her mother’s hand was heavy and cold. Minya couldn’t remember the rest of their song.

“Come away now,” her father called, touching her shoulder. She looked up at him and saw that his face was dry.

“Come away,” he said again. She stood as she was told. Her mother’s hand dropped back to the bed.

“I must leave and be gone from you for a few months,” her father said, and Minya looked around to see they were outside the stables now. The sun burned hot, hurting her eyes, and she couldn’t remember walking outside. “I would rather the trip weren’t so late, but with- things... moving along as they did...” he trailed off, worrying his lip. “Lady Modron and I are to be married,” he told her quickly. “Tonight.”

“Father,” she started, but found she had nothing to say and no way to say it around the pain in the back of her throat.

“You will be an older sister,” he said.

Her nostrils flared against the horse shit baking in the stables.

“Girl!” broad fingers clasped like a vice around her arm, and Arya wrenched away reflexively. The sun was close to meeting again with the sea, and Arya was on a ship with Ironborn soldiers. She looked up and saw it was the ship’s first mate who had her in his grasp, the man with the pointy tongue and the jagged scar down his face.

“Gotho says we dock in two nights,” he said, guiding her below deck. “Says he don’t want no chances of you jumping over or causing a ruckus. You’re to stay below until he comes for you.”

Arya bared her teeth, but the first mate was too tall to notice.

“So stay out the way,” he said, shoving her into the galley, “and be ready to enter the city by nightfall in two days.”

Arya waited until he left, then snatched two more hard rolls while the cook’s back was turned and slipped down the hall toward the trap door. The old man burbled happily when she threw him the stolen bread and promptly began to tear a roll apart. Arya sat across the hull from him and leaned against the wall, once again feeling the sea pressing in. She ran her hands up and down her temple and jaw, then around the full oval of her face. The skin was smooth and unmarked. She slid down onto her back and let her fingers rest against Needle’s hilt. The mysterious black stone knocked against her hip as she shifted.

Arya had taken the waif’s robe. She hadn’t given the extra weight much notice until she was safely aboard the Iron ship in the waif’s place. How had the dragonglass come to be in the waif’s possession? The last time she had seen it was in the kindly man’s knobbed fingers. Had it been Arya who had seen it, though? She wasn’t sure at the moment. She remembered how his hands gave him away, his fingers smoothing along the indentations carved into the side of the stone. Perhaps he did not covet the way other men did, but his hands told her a different story.

“Feeling better?” he asked, leaning back in his chair.

She blinked. Her eyes were gummy. The room was dusty and gray, almost blurred at the edges. She was curled under a scratchy blanket on a hard narrow bed. The walls were close and cold. A thin man with watery eyes sat a bit removed from her bedside, watching her. His fingertips tapped together in his lap, betraying an ounce of impatience.

She sat up slowly. A dull pressure pounded in her temples. A dozen pinpricks crawled up her throat as she righted herself, and she coughed against the pain.

“What-” she started and winced.

“Perhaps you should not speak just yet,” the man said gently. “It’s only been a few weeks. The body heals in its own time, though the mind wills otherwise.”

 _A few weeks since what?_ she wondered. She saw the bones set hard in Modron’s strange face, her dark eyes glassy and bitter. Her cheek pulsed and stung with the hot crack of her father’s knuckles. The upstairs window was open. Someone forgot to fix the latch.

She shifted on the bed and stared at the man, snapping the darker doors of her mind shut.

“You are stronger than you know,” he said, apropos of nothing. “I think we will find you quite useful. Someday you may even come to recognize the working of His will in your life, the series of events that brought you here. You will never fully recover, but then, most of us never do.”

She narrowed her eyes at him.

“You have been taken as an acolyte into the House of Black and White at your father’s insistence. It was a pittance for him, a small price to pay to save your life, keep his wife’s hands clean, and remove you from his house all at once. But you will pay the larger price, for death has shaped your short life, and death has a way of following those it marks early. Many would find the cost unbearable, but I do not think it will be too heavy for you. Tomorrow you will join me in the temple. Take the remainder of the day to rest.” He glanced around the close windowless room. She watched his fingertips tapping together. “When you are healthier, you can move to the servant’s floors. We are below ground now for your recovery, but upstairs we can find you a room with some natural light.”

“No,” she said, her voice rough, her throat burning. The man tilted his head and looked at her kindly. “I hate windows.”

A bright light burned behind her eyelids. Low voices muttered above her. The toothless man’s indignant sputtering cut off with a hard thump and a loud groan. Arya shook her head, confused, and the light grew brighter, closer, hotter. She tried to lean away from it, but something hard and solid pressed up against her back.

 

_‘The sea is cold but you are not!’ she cried,_

_‘You are strong and cruel and hot._

_I cannot turn my face to yours,_

_Or see your eyes or take your hand,_

_For surely I would burn._

 

_Oh Sun, I cannot be your friend._

_The sky, the sea, the sun, and me,_

_Apart, alone, destined to be_

_Separate without family.’_

 

“Are you mad?” Hands clasped her shoulders and rattled her against the ship’s floor. Arya blinked dancing black spots from her eyes and turned her face away from the first mate’s leering, a greasy lantern swinging in his hand.

Gotho leaned on his heels and waved the first mate back. Arya stared at his knobbed fingers and tried to remember where she was.

“What’s the matter with you?” the captain asked her in a low voice. Arya looked up and saw the waif’s reflection peering back at her from the light flickering in his eyes. He shifted uncomfortably. “It’s nearly time, girl. You’re coming with me.”

“I thought we were two days from shore,” she said. He looked at her oddly.

“I don’t have time to quibble with you,” he said. “We’re docking in an hour.” He clasped her wrist and pulled her to her feet. The first mate followed them up and out the trap door and fell in close behind them as Gotho led them down the hall. Arya blinked up at the first mate.

“Didn’t you tell me we were two days from shore?” she asked him, craning her neck to scan his lined face. She wasn’t looking where she went and tripped on an uneven lip in the floor. The first mate caught her shoulder and steered her back in line behind Gotho.

“So’s we were, two days ago,” he said, his hand heavy on her neck. “Focus, girl. You’ve a job to do.”

They marched above deck. It was dark but for a thousand dimly glittering stars above them. All Arya could see outside the light cast by the first mate’s lantern was the muted outline of shapes, but she could smell the difference in the air. Land, and trees, and snow. They were so close, they must be in the harbor, but Arya couldn’t understand how it was possible. Just that afternoon she had caught the first hint of a glimpse of shoreline. They had been days away, she thought. It alarmed her more than anything had since leaving Braavos, though she wasn’t quite sure what it was that she was frightened of.

Gotho opened the cabin door and stood back to allow the first mate to usher her in. He steered her to a hard chair in the corner and she sat, folding her hands in her lap, dazedly running her fingers over the length of polished obsidian stone hidden against her knee.

Men filtered in, some glancing at her sideways twisting up their noses as though they smelled rotten meat, others ignoring her completely. The first mate stood a little in front of her while Gotho spat and growled. He had hung his lantern from a peg in the wall near her head. Its light flickered halfheartedly as the ship rocked calmly toward White Harbor. Gotho grunted through the orders, outlining a rough plan with more brunt than tactics. They were less than five miles north of the city. Gotho would take the girl and see her slithered into the Merman’s Keep, then circle back around to lead the sack of the northern districts. They wanted to draw the wolves out, Gotho said, and cut them down before making their seaside escape, but Arya recognized a diversion strategy when she heard one.

The man was crouched at the lip of the tunnel, peering at its broken gate. A wind rushed from somewhere deep inside the water system, rattling the door again. He reached out a hand. She’d set her trap well, too well; he was walking in before she was ready.

“Help!” she screamed and wriggled backward through the slimy stone duct. The man looked up.

“ _Stop_ ,” Arya groaned. A familiar hand took her shoulder and she was on her feet again, legs moving woodenly at the first mate’s shoves.

She was running through filthy shallow water. She glanced over her shoulder, but the man hadn’t turned the corner yet. She found a small foothold in the back of the stone chamber and swung herself up, clinging to the wet rock.

“You!” the man yelled. She looked back to see him wading toward her. His eyes were cold and furious. She turned to the stone incline and jumped, just barely clasping her fingers around a patch of grass outside the narrow vent. She sunk her fingers deep into the dirt, her feet scrabbling on wet granite.

“Please,” Arya moaned, “please stop.” She’d seen things that weren’t there before, she’d muttered to herself before, but she’d never been mad before.

She was mad now, she was sure of it.

An elbow knocked cruelly against her ribs. “Shut it!” a voice hissed menacingly.

She slunk along the low stone wall, her breath misting in the cool night air. Her breathing was loud, much too loud, and she needed a better sight line to watch her back, but there wasn’t any time. She crouched low and pressed against the wall, leaning carefully around the corner, her cheek scraping against the rock. The way was clear.

 

_The sea’s cool voice was low,_

_A smooth trickle in her ear._

_The girl stepped in, held out her hand,_

_And the current drew her near._

 

It was dark in the city. The men were whispering behind her. Arya’s foot slipped and she pitched forward up a spiral stone staircase. Gotho turned and glared as she picked herself up and brushed bloody lines off her hands. They crept forward. She grasped the ragged ropes she had arranged into an elaborate pulley system and yanked down hard. Burlap wires unraveled from the rope in her sweaty hands and scraped her palms, but she continued dragging the pulley down until she felt the weight on the other end begin to move.

 

_‘Oh Sea, strong sea, cold sea,’ cried she,_

_‘Your hand is much too raw for me!’_

 

“In,” Gotho muttered and shoved her through an archway with a broken door into a dirty storage room. She wasn’t sure if they had made it inside the Keep or if they were biding time in an empty building. The first mate pushed her aside to make way for the men clomping in behind them. She ended up next to an open window. A torn piece of mangy fleece fluttered in the cold breeze. She tilted her head to glance at the muddy snow-covered street below them. It was a long way down. She hated windows.

The man was screaming inside the duct. His voice echoed off flat granite corners, eerily distorted by a rapid increase of water pressure.  She felt the last gate snap into place and began unwinding her ropes from the lever hidden in the wall.

“They’re not here,” a man spat angrily from the doorway. “They moved out days ago, heading west.”

Their eyes turned to Gotho.

“All of them?” he asked. “What about the brat?”

The man shrugged sourly. “Brat’s gone too,” he spat. He said something else, but Arya’s eyes returned to the window. ‘ _Brat’s gone too._ ’ Why hadn’t anyone fixed the latch? She’d known it was broken; she’d leaned against it just the week before and had to brace herself against the wall when it popped open, but she’d forgotten. It had been such a busy day, with Father returning and the baby screaming his head off at the very first light. It wasn’t her fault. Why hadn’t anyone fixed the latch on the window?

Arya pressed her face to the cold stone wall and groaned.

 

_‘You are not a friend to me,_

_Your eye too full, your hand too cold,_

_Your heart too big to fit in mine.’_

 

The man had stopped screaming. She wrapped the rope carefully around her waist and pulled her skirt up to hide the bulge. She hauled her leg over the low stone wall and pulled herself up. She skipped along the narrow beam, the black canal gleaming in the summer sun below her.

 

_The sky, the sea, the sun, and me,_

_Are there any else out there?_

 

A woman was shaking out a dusty sheet three stories above her. She leaned halfway out the window when she saw the little girl skipping along the wall and waved, beaming. The girl glared up at her and hurried along. She hated windows.

 

_Are there any else like me?_

 

The room was empty. Arya blinked. The sky was just beginning to gray out along the edges. The air smelled chalky with a slight tang of something bittersweet. She felt a trickle down her neck. Her fingers touched the wrinkled line where the waif’s stolen face clung to her temple. Her hand came back bloody.

Her heart pulsed painfully.

“I’m sorry,” she tried to say but choked on the words.

She was angry. It had been a long time since the waif had felt anything strongly, but she was angry now. Her hands shook as she twisted the lock on his desk. She knew his codes. She knew his guises. She knew his plots, ploys and tricks. She knew by the way he couldn’t stop himself from reaching for the Ironman’s gift that it was something more than he said. She found the soft pouch hidden behind a pile of books in his desk and pulled the black stone free of its covering. Her fingers wrapped around it easily, and it warmed slightly to her touch. She didn’t know what is was or why he wanted it, but he could go to hell before she would kill another little boy just so he could have it.

In thirty years, she’d done every chore, mixed every poison, completed every plan, killed every man he’d ever asked her to, but he should have known better this time. She supposed that though he only played a feeble old man, he’d overlooked how easily a disguise becomes part of the wearer, until one day, the mask no longer comes off because the face underneath has been irrevocably altered.

Footsteps in the hallway. She wasn’t alone after all. Arya turned and saw the first mate step through the empty doorway. His sword hung on his hip. His hands were empty. She wondered where he’d left his greasy lantern.

“Time to go,” he rasped, breathing heavily. He glanced tensely over his shoulder. She stared at him blankly. He turned back and exhaled impatiently when he saw her still standing by the window.

“Do I have to lead you around everywhere?” he hissed and strode toward her, reaching out his hand. She stood stock still until his fingers brushed her arm, then sidestepped and braced her foot on the heel of his boot. She grasped the hilt of his blade with both hands. He twisted back with a yell and the sword came free. The blade gored his leather jerkin like a knife through tough meat. She pushed. The first mate stumbled backward. She watched as his feet hit the wall. There was a moment when it seemed like he could still catch his balance, he could reach out and grab the lip of the window, a moment when his head was still firmly over his feet and he was still solidly in the room with her. It was a moment that she felt she’d lived before, and it lasted a lifetime.

Then he was gone, him and his sword, and Arya’s hands weren’t clean.

Modron was screaming down below. There were three floors between them, but Minya could see her glassy bloodshot eyes, her dark hair sticking to her neck with sweat and salt tears. One of the servants was crying in the hallway, a skinny, straw-haired girl only a few years older than Minya. Minya stared at the wall. She wasn’t sure it wasn’t all just a terrible dream. Any moment now, she would wake and the baby would be whining in the next room. She’d walk to his door and peek her head around the corner, pulling faces to make him laugh. Why hadn’t anyone fixed the latch on the window?

The sky was nearly blue, shot with low gray clouds, and Arya’s boots squished as she ran down a narrow road lined with close stone walls. A blacksmith was setting up a small rack of wares outside his shop, and stared as she ran past, feet slapping in the muddy snow.

“Where are you going, girl?” he called after her.

“To find my brother!” she called back. “I have to save him!”

Davet gurgled happily at the sight of her, bouncing impatiently in the maid’s arms. He waved his arms vigorously, fingers clenching into little fists, and let out a ringing, high-pitched squeal. Minya shushed him but took him from the maid and planted her lips on his wispy-haired head.

Men on horses were cantering through the western gate. Arya squinted past them and saw a ragged black line of foot-soldiers two hundred yards behind them. Guards were murmuring tensely between themselves, their eyes locked on the visitors riding through the gate and their retinue of men waiting for them just outside the city. Arya ducked her head and slipped between the horses and the wall. She thought she heard a familiar voice, but shook her head angrily at herself and walked quickly through the gate, staying close to the wall as she turned and hurried northward. She didn’t have time to follow voices, no matter how much they sounded like her dead father. She didn’t have time for delusions from another girl’s life. She was going to find her brother, and this time, she was going to save him.

She ran the last fifty yards into the woods.

 

_‘Little boy,’ said she, ‘this is my tree,_

_You look and act a lot like me.’_

 

Davet squirmed miserably in her arms. He was running a fever, his cheeks warm and chapped with tears and mucus. She hadn’t put him down more than five minutes today, and her back creaked with tension. She tilted her head from side to side, trying to relieve some of the stress in her neck, and Davet moaned.

Arya was still running. Her breaths were short and painful, her legs burning. Her cheeks were wet. _Please_ , she prayed, but who was she praying to? What was she praying for?

The maid staggered through the door, her arms straining around the last sloshing bucket of water for Davet’s bath. She swayed dangerously into the wall. Minya was tired, but her mother taught her to always extend a hand when help was needed. She set the baby down on the window ledge and turned to help the maid with the bathwater. They heaved the bucket over the lip of the tub together, the water displacing itself with gentle laps against the side. The maid looked up to thank her, and Minya would never forget the way her face slid from gratitude to horror. She thought of it often, when the kindly man showed her precisely where to make her cuts, when the masks dried side by side on the wall above her bed, when she pulled one down and stretched it out. The maid’s face had stretched just like that, when she looked up and saw that the ledge was empty, the shutters flapping obscenely in the summer breeze.

Someone forgot to fix the latch on the window.

 

_The sky too big, the sea too cold,_

_The sun too hot to be my friend._

_Is it you who I’ve been looking for?_

_Is my searching at an end?_

 

“Does Miss want to meet her brother?” the maid asked tentatively. Her straw-colored hair was straggly and her face gray with exhaustion, but an overstretched excitement bubbled below the surface. Her fingers tapped anxiously against her hips.

“What about Lady Modron?” Minya asked. Her heart skipped a few beats in spite of herself.

“The Lady’s sleeping, Miss,” the maid answered. “She’ll be abed for several weeks. She’ll want you to care for him meantime, I’m sure.” Minya pursed her lips. She didn’t share the maid’s conviction, but she stood and followed her into the nursery, wiping her sweaty palms on her skirt.

The baby was quiet, but he wasn’t sleeping. He stared up at the hanging stars dangling above the bassinet, and blinked when she poked her head over the side.

“What’s his name?” Minya asked. The baby’s lips moved at the sound of her voice.

“Lady called him ‘Davet,’” the maid answered. “She says it means ‘lovely one,’ or ‘my love,’ or-”

“Beloved,” Minya smiled. She thought of picking wildflowers, and laying on an open hillside, watching clouds roll by. She thought of her mother’s voice, swept up in a summer breeze, her arms pulling Minya down into her lap, her lips pressed against Minya’s cheek. She tickled the baby’s tiny palm, and his fingers wrapped around hers.

“ _Place your heart inside my heart_ , _And I’ll place yours in mine,_ ” she sang.“ _I’ll keep you safe and close, beloved, My eyes, my hand, my face, my heart Are yours, and you are mine._ ”

Arya’s skirts were soaked and wrapped like icy claws around her ankles. She knelt underneath a snowy pine tree. The needles scratched her face and caught in her wet hair. Her fingers scrabbled at the bloody line where the waif’s mask peeled away.

“I’m sorry,” she cried, her chest aching with icy breaths. Her hands were full of blood and tears. “I was wrong,” she gasped. “I’ll never do it again, I promise.”

 _Yes, you will_ , the waif whispered in her ear.

Arya sobbed.


	12. Sansa VI

She walked the interior perimeter, running her hand over thick-paned glass. It was warm and moist on her palm. The air was sticky sweet, the sun hot where it hit the glass, refracting amidst the humid greenery.

“What do you plant in these lines?” she asked the older woman, whose dark hair and gray eyes combined to present a traditionally Northern appearance.

The woman glanced down where Sansa pointed. “Radishes, m’lady. And here we have spinach, and cabbage next to that. Them are beets, and sweet cucumbers and tomatoes on the other end. I wanted carrots, but they wouldn’t take. I’ve had berries grow here before, but I couldn’t give ‘em the proper space, with winter comin’ on.”

“I see,” Sansa said, ruminating. “And how many help you here, with this garden?”

“It’s just me and my girl Marla,” the woman responded proudly. “My husband and our boys do the hunting and trading, so’s they’re not much here when the sun shines. We used to have chickens, and cattle, too, on winters when I was a girl, when my grandfather and uncles were still alive. That’s what the other glass garden’s there for.”

“I wondered,” Sansa peered across the field toward the other structure. Sticky brambles clustered around it above the snow, but the glass looked sound, and she could see the faint outline of crumbling wooden pens within. “How safe do you think the road is, from here to White Harbor?”

The woman leaned down to pull a handful of weeds clogging a radish plant and stuffed it in her apron. “A girl used to walk from here to town on her own with no fear of danger. Now I don’t travel without my husband, that’s just good sense... but sometimes I fear for the boys, too. They carry weapons but on’y two of the five know how to use ‘em proper.”

“And what of the road from here to Winterfell?”

The woman widened her eyes at Sansa and shook her head. “No one go there now,” she said gravely. “Not since the last little Starks were strung up and the castle burnt.”

Sansa narrowed her eyes. “You have no news of Winterfell? None who have ridden past and shared word?”

The woman shook her head adamantly. “No, m’lady, we’re far enough off the road that most don’t know they pass us. Well hidden, here, with the woods between us. You gave me quite a fright, you know, when’s you rode up with all them horses ‘round. Don’t rightly know how you knew we was here, m’lady.”

Sansa studied the cabbage plants growing at her feet. “Would you like more glass gardens and more help here? And chickens and cattle, pigs too, perhaps?”

The woman squinted her gray eyes suspiciously, her dirty hands stilling on the apron at her waist. “Why?” she demanded. “Where’s it come from? Who would it be? Where’d they stay?”

“You are Corley Ashwood, are you not?” Sansa asked. The woman’s eyes widened, but she snapped her mouth shut defiantly. “Your grandfather was Burrill Ashwood, and your father Carlon. Your family held the Wolf’s Den a thousand years ago, but now you are a lesser House on the outskirts of White Harbor, and winter does not go easily for you or your cousins, does it?”

“Winter is winter, it don’t go easy for any of us,” the woman snapped. “M’lady.”

“True,” Sansa agreed. “But you and I are uniquely positioned to aid our countrymen throughout this coming winter. It will be hard work, but there will be reward in it for you when spring comes again.”

“How?” the woman asked. “And how much?”

Sansa picked a small, ripe tomato and bit gingerly. The taste was sweet and earthy. “I am Sansa Stark Lannister,” she said. “I rode here with my father and my older brother when I was eight years old, which is how I knew you would be here, though I wasn’t sure of the way. I have an army near eight thousand men coming up the road from White Harbor to take back Winterfell from Roose Bolton.” The woman looked so aghast that Sansa took pity and smiled at her genially. “It is my wish to rebuild not only Winterfell, but the North. My father did not leave affairs quite as prosperous as one could have hoped, and war has left us badly prepared for the coming winter. I would send four hundred of my men back to White Harbor to purchase glass, seeds and livestock enough to rebuild Winterfell’s glass gardens and increase yours by five. I would leave two hundred men to patrol the road from here to White Harbor, and the other two hundred from here to Winterfell, and make you the primary outpost of agriculture for three hundred miles all around.”

“What of Winterfell?” Corley Ashwood asked. “Winterfell could serve that purpose, has done in the past.”

Sansa was pleased to find the woman sharp. “Winterfell needs serve the great stretch from Deepwood Motte to Last Hearth. We must build outposts that connect each other in trade. Winterfell will not be able to grow such a variety as your soil supports, though we have more space and more hands.”

“Who else are you building up with glass gardens?”

“Dear woman, I have not yet won Winterfell,” Sansa said, a touch exasperatedly. “I would rebuild its glass gardens and yours within two moons, and will consider locations for more outposts once Winterfell’s seat is my family’s again. We will need at least one further south and another northeast. Perhaps the Dreadfort will be made to serve a useful purpose,” she mused. “In any case,” she pinned Corley Ashwood with a look, “if you and your family help me in this, I will repay you twice over when spring comes again, and find education and stations in noble Houses for your sons and daughter if you wish.”

“Three times over,” the woman demanded, though Sansa saw her hands twist together nervously. She sighed.

“Twice, if you do as I ask, and four times if you coordinate an outpost at Moat Cailin for me once you are set up here.”

“Moat Cailin!” Corley Ashwood exclaimed. “No one lives in that swamp besides the mud men! Better to have it at Barrowton, m’lady.”

Sansa contemplated her suggestion. “Barrowton is near five hundred miles from here,” she said. _And Lady Dustin is one of my party now._

“Four hundred,” the woman shrugged, “but one can reach from the Borrowlands all the way to Sea Dragon Point from Barrowton easily enough by boat, though I’d avoid the Cape, for sure.”

“And the Reeds can care for the crannogmen,” Sansa mused, warming to the idea. “You could do this, Corley Ashwood?” she asked. “It would be much easier to carry supplies by the Kingsroad to Moat Cailin than to Barrowton.”

“I could do it,” she said, lifting her chin defiantly. “I’ll need another two hundred men to ride the road and bring supplies, of course. And you’ll be sure to get a full reckoning of my services when winter’s past.”

Sansa laughed. “I’m sure I will, good woman.” She held out her hand in the space between them. “Let us start with Ashwood of the Knife, and when Winterfell’s structures are rebuilt, I will send you two hundred men.”

Corley Ashwood smiled, revealing a small gap between her front teeth, and shook her hand. “M’lady,” she said and curtsied low to the ground.

Sansa rode back through the snowy woods alongside Ser Marlon. When she asked if White Harbor could purchase glass for ten more gardens, he shrugged and said the cost was nothing.

“Make it twenty, then,” she replied. “And seeds to fill twelve, chickens for four, and larger livestock for the rest. I’m sending four hundred men back to the city today.”

“Four hundred!” he exclaimed. “My lady, we have not even reached Winterfell!”

“What use is it to take back Winterfell if we cannot rebuild it or use it to feed the North?” she asked him. “Besides, we move so slowly, they may very well reach us before the fighting is over.”

He shook his head to signify his disagreement, but did not argue with her. “Who will you send, my lady?” he asked.

“I’m not sure,” she admitted. “My cousin believes that the soldiers are here to see blood, and since I’ve reunited with my angry little brother, I tend to agree with him. I would have trustworthy men who desire peace and prosperity for the North. Our Vale men will be returning South before too long, but some of our Northerners may find the call agreeable, particularly if they have family in White Harbor. What do you think, Ser Marlon?”

He looked at her strangely. “I think there will be those who are moved by your words,” he said.

“We must do this,” she said. “Lady Dustin tells me that Roose Bolton’s men are weak and starving. Winterfell may very well be in Stannis’ hands by now. I do not know him, but I think Stannis cannot desire Winterfell for himself. He will want my army,” she decided, “to declare himself King of Westeros. But where will he take them? And why did he come North to begin with?”

“He was at the Wall not a year ago,” Ser Marlon told her, “to aid your brother the Lord Commander against a wildling invasion. He left part of his force behind with his Red Woman.”

“Red Woman?” Sansa asked, hair prickling at the back of her neck. “Who is she?”

“A fire priestess, I’ve heard,” Ser Marlon said. “Lord Stannis took her god as his own, and it is said she is his closest counselor. I’ve heard men denounce her as a witch, but just as many more whose love for her burns brightly.”

“And she is at the Wall with Jon,” Sansa whispered, and thought of long white fingers knitting sticky black holes back together. She rubbed her own blackened fingertips, covered in soft fur gloves, uncertain.

“Lady Sansa,” Ser Marlon said, “I will gather four hundred men and coordinate your glass gardens myself.”

“You?” Sansa asked in consternation. “Don’t misunderstand me, ser,” she said quickly. “I know you are trustworthy and capable, but you traveled all that way to retrieve me and Robert. Is not your cousin awaiting you at Winterfell? Did you not come for the fight?”

He snorted softly, eyes crinkling as he regarded her warmly. “No doubt you have noticed I am in better shape than my whale of a cousin,” he said with a wry smile, “but I am still an old man. I have seen many winters, but none that put in me such fear as the one soon upon us. My cousin and I were ready to hole ourselves up in White Harbor before we discovered that your brother was alive. But your brother is still a child, though he has experienced great loss in his short life. Lord Manderly and I might have bled Winterfell to wrest it from Roose Bolton’s grasp, only to give it to an angry boy who couldn’t manage it, while we returned safely to White Harbor and left the North to starve. We thought that was the best we could hope for.” Ser Marlon rubbed his mouth thoughtfully. “Lady Dustin saw another option, and I have come to take her side on the matter.”

Sansa blinked at him. “Ser Marlon,” she said, “I am grateful to you for your support, but who will lead the White Harbor forces against Roose Bolton? We must take Winterfell for any of my plans to come to fruition!”

“Your Bronze Yohn Royce is quite a capable commander. He has all the Vale forces in hand, not just his own Runestone men, and my cousin’s forces at Winterfell will join you when you reach them. The battle will be short; Roose Bolton is outnumbered three to one. The men have your cousin, the cheeky little Lord of the Vale, and your brother, the fierce young Lord of Winterfell, to stand behind.” Ser Marlon tilted his head, his lip quirking up on one side. “And you, of course, they have to drink to and dream of and fight for: their beautiful, maiden councilor of the North.”

“I am married, my lord; how do you know I am maiden?” Sansa demanded, though she blushed hotly.

He looked away politely. “My lady,” he said, “everyone knows what Bronze Yohn’s septon witnessed.”

An uncomfortable molten pit burned in her stomach. “Well, good,” she muttered, “though I wish it were not so important.” They had reached the road, where the long train of foot soldiers trudged through slushy brown snow. The air was cold, but it had not snowed once since she had returned to the North, nor for weeks prior, she had been informed. The sun shone brightly, and it grew warm enough a few hours each day for the snow to melt back by inches, only to freeze again at night in slippery, treacherous patches. Two thousand of her men were mounted, but the rest battled through snow and sludge to traverse the four hundred miles from White Harbor to Winterfell, and today she would be sending four hundred horses back to the city on an errand she was not sure would come to make any difference once the snows set upon them in earnest. “Very well, Ser Marlon,” she turned to him, “I shall be grateful to place this task in your hands. I hope we may turn the tides with it, though I fear it is too little too late. I will miss your company, and your counsel.”

He smiled at her and nodded graciously. “I am honored, my lady. I leave you in good company, else I could not bear to go, though I have known you only briefly.”

“I hope you are right,” Sansa said softly as Lady Dustin approached with Ser Davos Seaworth.

“Lady Sansa,” the smuggler-turned-lord addressed her politely, “your visit was successful?”

“Quite, Ser Davos,” she said stiffly. “Ser Marlon is returning to White Harbor with four hundred men to rebuild the glass gardens here and to resupply Winterfell once it is ours again.”

Lady Dustin peered into the woods where they had emerged, attempting to spy the settlement Sansa had known was tucked away, though it was well hidden from the road. “The Ashwoods of the Knife are still here, are they?” she said appraisingly. “I never would have guessed they’d have survived. They’ve always been a bit backwood, though.”

“It’s the prime location for an outpost,” Sansa said decisively. “Equidistant to White Harbor and Winterfell, right on the Knife for easy travel to the city or to receive travelers from further north. Ser Marlon,” she addressed him formally, “I send you with my hopes and my heart. Please ready your men. I would have you on your way within the hour.”

“Today?” Ser Davos cut in, surprised. “Is that wise, m’lady? Should we not take Winterfell first, and coordinate with King Stannis to raise outposts?” His head swiveled between Ser Marlon and Lady Dustin.

“Don’t look at me,” Barbrey Dustin smirked. “I don’t give the commands here, our Lady Lannister does.”

“Thank you, Lady Dustin,” Sansa snapped, irritated. “Ser Marlon,” she nodded courteously and kicked her horse to ride up alongside the foot soldiers, looking for her cousin and younger brother. The mounted soldiers rode at the front and the back of the train, outriders manning all sides for passersby. They had not come upon any in the six days since they departed White Harbor, but Sansa knew the settlements were set far back from the road, and their party must have been spotted along the way.

“It’s not a terrible idea,” she heard a grudging voice venture behind her. She turned to find Lady Dustin trailing her, straight-backed and proud on her gray courser. The horse was too big for her by a half, but Barbrey had insisted she could manage. Sansa had watched, impressed, as she jumped and swung her leg gracefully over the beast to sit astride it.

“No?” Sansa asked, turning away to continue her search. “You’re not following to tell me it would be wiser to wait until after the battle, then?”

“I’m not,” the woman said, sounding offended. “Gods know we have waited long enough already.”

Sansa slowed slightly to allow her to catch up. “Ser Davos would have me wait to consult with his King Stannis,” she mused.

Barbrey snorted. “Ser Davos is five times too loyal to a man who shortened him three fingers.”

“He will demand them, though,” Sansa said quietly, so Barbrey had to lean in to catch her words. “Stannis will demand these soldiers for his own, and my allegiance.”

Lady Dustin rode alongside her silently for a time.

“Have you ever seen something you knew shouldn’t exist?” she asked Sansa suddenly. “Not wrong, like the evils men do. Something that should not be, that breaks everything you ever thought about the world?”

Sansa thought of the wolves, and red sap, and black smoke rising where weirwoods snapped and burst. “I’m not sure,” she said, “but if I have learned anything since my father died, it is that my view of the world is not always accurate.”

Lady Dustin nodded, eyes on the reins clutched tightly in her gloved fingers. “I saw a dead man walk again,” she said, “though he was still dead, and death was all he craved. I was only a small girl at the time. My mother told me it was a townsman driven to vengeance because my father could not take him in. It was winter, and our house was as full as it had ever been. The man came knocking one night, delirious from the cold, and hungry too. He brought us a small white cat in offering. My father told him that it was not enough to make a meal, and turned him away. I followed him for my heart was still soft, and I thought to buy the cat from him for a loaf of bread and a sack of watered ale. I had almost reached him, needed only turn out onto the road just a handful of trees away, when I saw two others approach. They bashed him with a frozen log in the temple, as quiet as mice, though the cat hissed and spit at them. When they saw he had no gold or food, nothing besides the clothes on his back and the angry white cat, they became irate and beat him bloody. They tried to do in for the cat as well, but he ran from them into the woods, a blessing I thought at the time.” Barbrey Dustin turned her head to the frigid white branches bordering their path to the right. “The man came a second time, though. He came to my father’s house and knocked, and pounded, and bashed and _bashed_ upon the door. My father met him with three guards, and it took all four to put the man down, and every time he went down, he came back up again.” She looked at Sansa, a fearful question in her gray eyes. “He was _dead_ , though. I saw him die. And they could not put him down, until finally they built a pier in the frozen grass outside my father’s door and burnt him, still struggling. No one spoke of the man, and when I asked, my mother told me to stop telling stories.”

“You do not believe it was a story, though,” Sansa said and tried to choke the chill in her spine.

“I convinced myself it was until I visited the Wall, shortly after my husband passed.” Barbrey told her. “When I realized that William would not return, I knew that the care and oversight of House Dustin would fall to me. I had good nephews and cousins of good nephews, and not enough good land or wives to give them. I brought two of them to join the Watch and stayed three nights at Shadow Tower, far past my welcome as a woman. Derek was with me, and he convinced a few rangers to talk with us in exchange for some of our wine. The tales they told... Derek joked afterward how men go mad without women nearby to warm them. But they saw what I saw when I was a little girl, and they feared what I feared, what I have always feared since then. They said that it was growing, that more would come, and reports from the Wall have been nothing if not desperate of late. If Stannis wants to return there, then he knows something of what is coming. And if he wants men...” she trailed off, uncharacteristically uncertain.

“Then I should give them to him?” Sansa asked, more sharply than she intended.

Barbrey considered her for a moment, then tossed her greying hair behind her shoulder. “Do what you will,” she said haughtily. “Your outposts are a good idea, though they will never work if you cannot open travel or supply all great Houses with their own gardens to feed the hill people that will flock to them.”

“All great Houses!” Sansa exclaimed. “How am I to pay for such an undertaking, or coordinate it before the snows come again?”

“I hear your family is rather wealthy,” Lady Dustin shrugged coolly.

“Winterfell has been _burnt_ ,” she said deliberately as if to a small child, “it cannot support its own gardens, much less the rest of the North’s.”

“Not Winterfell, girl,” Lady Dustin snapped, “Casterly Rock."

Sansa sat on her roan, stunned. “Casterly Rock?” she repeated, dumbfounded. “Do you imagine I can simply write to Casterly Rock, ‘the North is not so well off right now, please send some gold?’ What are you _thinking_?” She was so exasperated that she couldn’t keep her voice toned, and the men turned and stared. She spurred her horse forward ahead of Lady Dustin.

“It is a long shot, I grant you,” the woman huffed behind her, keeping pace easily on her courser, “but you should not disregard it so simply.”

Sansa shook her head and ground her teeth together. She burned with frustration and considered riding on, daring Lady Dustin to trail her, when she spotted Robert and Rickon sparring with swords in a cluster of trees, Maester Colemon patiently observing atop his yellow mare. She reined up next to him and watched as the boys clanged shortswords together.

“You’re not holding it right!” Robert sheathed his weapon efficiently in the scabbard at his belt. He stepped forward and reached out a hand to correct his cousin’s grip, but Rickon thrust the blade in front of him.

“Don’t come a step closer,” he warned. “I may not know how to use a sword as well as you, but at least I know not to put my weapon away when an enemy comes near.”

“Lord Rickon,” Maester Colemon reprimanded, but Robert only laughed.

“Where’s the enemy, then?” he challenged Rickon. “Are you going to fight me?”

“I could!” Rickon exclaimed. “I could hit you with a spear from fifty feet away!”

“Yes,” Robert said patiently, “but then you would have thrown your only spear and been without a weapon. Will you let me show you? It’s no fun playing with someone who doesn’t know how to do it properly.”

Rickon grudgingly relented, and Robert took his wrist deliberately. Sansa turned aside, smiling, and saw that Barbrey Dustin had blocked her mare with her gray courser, her hands folded gently on the pommel as she faced the long train of foot soldiers, watching placidly. Sansa sighed and pulled on the reins to back the mare in place next to her.

“Do you know your father well?” she asked suddenly.

Barbrey turned to her, eyebrows raised. “Yes,” she said.

“Does he love you?” Sansa asked.

“Yes, I believe he does,” Barbrey answered quietly.

“And do you think he is proud of you,” Sansa asked, watching the men walking past, on their way to Winterfell, “of what you have done with your circumstances, and what you have become?”

Barbrey turned to regard the army flooding past as well while she considered Sansa’s question. “I’m not sure,” she admitted. “I know it is not what he would have wished for me. But it is not exactly what I would have wished for myself.”

“No,” Sansa agreed, “but when things are easy, we never know quite what we are capable of.”

“I have done what I had to do,” Barbrey continued. “My father could not have imagined that I would be head of House Dustin. He made what match he could for me, and while I was not thrilled by my husband at first, I must admit he grew on me. He was... _refreshing_ ,” she smiled, and hitched herself higher on the saddle. “Unconcerned with doubts or worries or trivial concerns, and unfailingly honest. He approached each morning with gratitude and joy, and each night, too.” She paused, clenching the pommel beneath gloved fingers. “I have not shamed his House or let it fall into dishonor,” she said fiercely. “I have maintained Barrowton, I have _improved_ it, all for some distant nephew or cousin of my William’s to claim it when I am gone.” She spoke defensively, though Sansa was in no position to judge her.

“You did not want to marry,” Sansa said, a question in her voice, “but your father made you.”

“No, I wanted to marry. It was the only way out of my father’s house. He loved me, but...”

“But he did not know you,” Sansa said.

Barbrey’s grey eyes examined her, wrinkles crinkling down her cheek. “What are these questions for?” she asked. “Do you wish your father had known you better before he died?”

“No,” Sansa shook her head with a smile, “no, my father knew me _quite_ well. I was not a very difficult child to know, for there really was not much to me besides what anyone could see. But I have been thinking of my sister, of Arya recently, and wondering... You remind me of her,” she tilted her head at the woman, “you have similar coloring, and you annoy me nearly as bad as she did at times.” Barbrey snorted, but Sansa saw her lips twitch. “My father loved Arya, but he did not understand her,” she said, growing serious. “This sham of a wedding with Ramsay Bolton... he would never have seen her marry such a monster, but he would have wanted her to marry, to be a lady to one of his bannermen, and Arya could never have followed through. I do not think he would have forced her, or turned her away... but would he have loved her, after that? Would he have allowed her some other goal or pursuit, could he have imagined her worth as anything other than a noble Northern lady?” Sansa shook her head, afflicted.

“Could he have imagined _your_ worth,” Barbrey asked, “as _the_ noble Northern lady?”

“Ser Marlon called me something similar today. He called me the ‘maiden councilor of the North’.” Barbrey chuckled, nodding. “You are making me something I am not,” Sansa said, distressed. “I am not Lady of Winterfell, nor Warden of the North. I am no commander or leader in battle, and I cannot even hold a sword! I will do what I can to help the North survive this winter, but I have no real power to make things right!”

“You will do what you can, so you _are_ powerful,” Barbrey said confidently. When Sansa gazed at her blankly, she sighed. “You and I were born with advantages and disadvantages. We were raised to do as our fathers told us, but we were also educated, well-fed, well-bred. We have always known that some choices would never be ours, but we also know that our names afford us opportunities other women do not have. Your history, your home, your brother and your cousin, your youth, beauty, and those wits knocking about in your head, they all stand behind you as an illusion of power, just as your name does- _both_ of your names, which you seem to understand though you refuse to acknowledge it.

“But power is not a title, no more than it is any of those things standing behind you. Power exists only in action, by doing what you can to change things, or to make them stay the same. It just so happens you have a lot of reasons to convince men- _and_ women- to listen to you, perhaps even follow you if they can stand behind what you are doing. And if they love you and the actions you take and the actions they take for you, who is going to shout about how your child brother is Lord of Winterfell or that some new southern king has not decreed you Warden of the North?”

Sansa sat, mulling her words. She had never thought of herself as powerful, especially not when she was the king’s betrothed- but she had been trapped and muzzled then, unable to act as she wished, even as her title placed her in the highest esteem. She had some advantages, that was true enough, though she might have wished for fewer in exchange for the rest of her family.

“You probably should learn how to hold a sword, though,” Lady Dustin mused thoughtfully. Sansa dismounted and stalked to where Robert and Rickon were still sparring, tiring slowly in the thick wet snow.

“Come, boys,” she said, holding out her hand. “We’re going to battle in a few days. Now show me how to hold that thing, and how to swing without dropping it.”


	13. Rickon II

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's another installment of the story that WILL be finished, even if it takes me ten years! We'll be riding magnetized train cars in space by the time I'm done!
> 
> Please review, it really makes my day.

Horses nickered nervously and ice crunched under heavy boots as men prepared for battle outside the tent.

“We cannot know what is happening without getting closer, and we cannot get closer without our presence being noted,” Bronze Yohn said. He stood with Sansa, Ser Davos, Maester Colemon, Lady Dustin and her two shields, Ser Templeton and two more men, an officer from White Harbor and an officer from Heart’s Home. Robert stood slightly outside the circle at Rickon’s left.

“What is your counsel, Lord Royce?” Sansa asked.

“Approach tonight,” he said, the deep lines of his wrinkles set in his stark and serious face. “Ride in full force inside the walls and surround the castle with foot soldiers. Wait until dark, but no later.”

“What of Lord Stannis?” Sansa asked. “What of Lord Manderly, inside the gates?”

“Lord Manderly’s men will join you when you attack,” Lady Dustin said to Bronze Yohn. “They are expecting you, though we have no way to send word.”

Bronze Yohn nodded. “Forty-five hundred Bolton men and another fifteen Freys... with the Manderlys inside, and our eight thousand outside, they cannot but throw down their weapons and bend the knee, once they see the Starks we bring home. More than a few swords will be bloodless when this is over.”

“There _must_ be blood,” Sansa said, and their heads turned to her in surprise.

Maester Colemon cleared his throat. “My lady, Lord Royce’s plan is good,” he said softly, “efficient and restrained. We should take Winterfell judiciously and afterwards hold trials for the accused.”

“Trials?” Sansa repeated doubtfully.

Rickon thought of sitting at court with Bran after Robb had left, and groaned inwardly. He hoped he would see some real fighting.

“What of Lord Stannis?” Sansa asked again. “I would not make him an enemy before my brother has even taken our father’s seat. We should find a way to send word.”

“Scouts questioned some Umber men they found casting around the walls,” Bronze Yohn told her. “Stannis and his forces are holed up in a crofter’s village two days west of Winterfell, trying to draw Roose Bolton out. The Umbers reported less than five thousand soldiers still alive, mostly clansmen, and maybe forty horses. It's likely they’ve eaten the rest.”

Ser Davos stepped forward. “King Stannis _will_ come to your aid, m’lady. I will deliver your message.”

“He is days away, Ser Davos, how do you expect him to help us tonight?” He looked to reply, but Lord Royce set a heavy hand on his shoulder, and he snapped his mouth shut. Sansa studied them.

“Maester Colemon,” she said, “you will ride to Stannis.”

“The maester?” Lady Dustin spat incredulously, as Maester Colemon looked up, aghast.

“Yes,” she said decisively. “You should leave immediately. Take Ser Derek and two others. We will approach as Lord Royce advises, an hour after nightfall. White Harbor men inside the gates will be received as part of our army, and the enemy rounded up for trial.” She looked around the group gathered about her, eyes sliding briefly to Robert and then to Rickon before turning back to Lord Royce. “I thank you for your counsel. We shall speak again inside the walls of Winterfell.” Bronze Yohn bowed and gestured at the other captains to follow him outside. Each man tilted his head to Sansa and then to Robert and Rickon before following Lord Royce.

Rickon bounced on his toes, ready to run with Shaggy around the soldiers outside. Maybe Robert would play swords with him again.

“Thank you, Maester Colemon,” he heard Sansa say. “We will see each other soon.” The maester bowed quickly, dark stringy hair falling over his face, and left, wringing his hands together nervously. He seemed an odd choice to Rickon, who was not overly fond of the man. Maester Colemon liked to hover over him and Robert, jumping in the middle of their spats. Robert was bossier than Bran, and he definitely whined more than Bran, but Rickon supposed he was alright. Maester Colemon seemed to think they couldn’t get along for ten minutes, and for his part, Rickon was glad the maester would not be babysitting them tonight.

“I would have thought you would find it an honor to accompany my brother into the castle, Ser Davos,” Rickon heard Sansa say lightly.

“My lady,” Ser Davos started, aggrieved, “I should return to King Stannis. I am his Hand, and Lord Royce’s reports are hardly promising. He needs me-”

“You will return to him,” Sansa promised him. “After I see my brother Rickon into Winterfell, and after I greet Lord Stannis myself. Thank you, Ser Davos.” She turned to Rickon. “Shaggy is outside?” she asked him. When he nodded, she continued. “Keep him close. You and Robert should stay with Ser Bryen. Do not be parted from each other, do you hear me?” Rickon side-eyed Robert and saw him nodding earnestly. He sighed, crossing his arms, and agreed grudgingly. “Come back here when night falls,” she told them. “Ser Bryen,” and the shield nodded and ushered them outside.

The cool afternoon air was clean and wet on Rickon’s nose. Everywhere he looked, he saw snow, slushy, dirty snow, and spots of mud here and there where a cart had stood for a few hours in the midday sun. He did not recognize anything about their surroundings, but the smell was comforting and familiar.

“This way, Rickon,” his cousin Robert ordered him, grabbing his arm to steer him past a tent from which smoke billowed out, the clang of stone against steel ringing in his ears. Ser Bryen strode ahead of them, long, purposeful steps stomping thick, squishy footprints in the muddy snow.

“Where is he going?” Rickon asked Robert, a bit peeved. The man had not turned back to look their way once since exiting the tent.

“I think we’re going to the sparring grounds, but I’m not sure,” Robert said.

“Do you always follow anyone who’s supposed to be looking after you, instead of doing what you want?” Rickon asked, although he certainly wouldn’t complain if they were going to the sparring grounds.

Robert dropped his arm and stalked off ahead of him. Rickon saw him cross his arms and set his shoulders stubbornly. Robert didn’t have to be so huffy, Rickon thought. He’d only asked a question.

Rickon rubbed his hands together and slowed a bit. He loved walking amongst the soldiers’ camp, and there was excitement in the frigid air this afternoon. Men were shouting to each other across the fields, standing in clumps and circles, muttering under their breath. Soldiers stopped, their heads turning when Robert passed, hurriedly following Ser Bryen, Rickon trailing behind. He looked around and caught several men staring at him, so he stared back, hoping one of them would step forward and challenge him to pull out his sword, or do something interesting. But the men only bowed at him, muttering “ _m’lord_ ” before turning back to their own business, and Rickon had no choice but to squelch on through the muddy snow behind Robert.

Shaggy caught up with him as they rounded the eastern slope bordering gray woods, the circular clearing of the sparring grounds coming into view. Men clustered at the edges, while pairs hammered swords at each other in the center. Rickon saw that three pairs danced around the perimeter. Two men were getting sorely beaten down but the last pair appeared evenly matched. In the center, one man stood against two attackers, his sword flashing as it swung up to meet an opponent’s downward blow, then across his body, quick as lightning, to hold back the other man.

A soldier on the perimeter stumbled over his feet and fell face-first into a slushy pool. “Bloody oaf!” someone shouted nearby. A roar of laughter went up among the crowd, as the man turned over and held up his hands in surrender, muddy rivers dripping down his face. Rickon felt a great rush of excitement wash from the top of his head down to his toes, and he jumped and screamed, “ _Bloody oaf!_ ” The soldier limped from the circle, the man in the middle holding his own against his two waning defenders.

“Rickon!” he heard Robert hiss next to him, looking about conscientiously as men laughed and cheered Rickon on. He felt a hand clasp his shoulder and looked up to see Bryen holding him in place, a smirk curling his coarse brown beard.

“Careful, boy,” he grunted. “Or do you want them thinking you’d like a go?”

“I’ll do it!” Rickon shouted, wrenching his shoulder away. “I can throw a spear better than any of you! I’ll kill a man fifty feet away!”

“Then you’ll be down a spear, and have to face his angry friends with that sword you can’t swing properly,” Bryen scoffed, and the men nearby laughed again. Robert threw back his head with a stupid, smug look on his face.

“Just try me, I dare you!” Rickon stomped angrily. He felt a warm shadow brush past his hand and saw Shaggy prowling a slow circle around him, sniffing at the ground. A silence fell, and Rickon was glad to see the men who had laughed edging away carefully.

Bryen looked down at him. “You want to fight?” he said gruffly. “You ever kill a man, boy?”

“I’ve ripped their throats out and licked blood off my hands,” Rickon shot back. “I’ve shook them ‘til their bones crunched between my teeth and eaten their warm hearts whole.”

His wolf prowled circles around him, a great black oblivious shield. Bryen shook his head and spat on the ground.

“No you haven’t,” he said. “Mayhap you’ve licked blood off your _paws_ , but don’t lie and say it’s the same thing.”

Rickon’s eyes flicked down to Shaggy, the wolf’s fur brushing his thigh as he rounded behind him, nose to the ground. _How did Ser Bryen know?_

“Fighting is death, either yours or his,” Bryen said. “Your wolf understands, but you won’t, not so long as you hide behind him.”

“I don’t hide behind him-” Rickon started in indignation, but the sworn shield cut him off.

“Pull out your sword, boy,” he prompted. “Let’s see your stance.”

Rickon put his hand to the hilt of his sword where it hung at his side. He was suddenly uncertain. Truth be told, no one had ever taught him anything about swordplay except for Robert. He had watched his brothers and then, after they left him, the stupid Walders, but everyone had thought that he was too small to teach back at Winterfell. Now he was at Winterfell again, and he still hadn’t had a proper sword fight.

He slid the sword from its scabbard and swung it in front of him boldly. At least he could hold it without wobbling, and that was more than Robert could do at times.

Bryen looked down his nose at Rickon. “Not bad,” he said, “there’s some strength in your legs. But you’re holding your arm out too far. Anybody could just slap the end of your sword, and it would drop right out your hand.”

“It would not!” Rickon protested, and before he could open his mouth again, the man brought his gloved fist down on the flat of Rickon’s blade. His wrist jerked, his palm opened, and the sword tumbled down into a slushy pool at his feet. Shaggy rounded in front of him, curious at the splat, and sniffed Bryen’s boots amiably. The man reached out a cautious hand and gripped the fur at his neck. Shaggy allowed a few strokes, then turned and settled in the mud just behind Rickon again. _At least he didn’t lick him_ , Rickon thought. Ever since White Harbor, Shaggy had a mind of his own. He was more relaxed, curious, even friendly at times. Rickon thought that Robert’s little dog was having a bad influence on him, and he didn’t like it one bit.

“Come, boys,” Bryen said, “You can learn a great deal from watching.” He turned back to the sparring grounds, where the man in the middle had disarmed both his opponents, and two more fights had started across the perimeter. Rickon stooped to pick up his wet sword, reluctantly sliding it back into its sheath. “Do you see how that man leans back to avoid the blows?” Rickon watched and nodded. “He’s going to lose,” Bryen commented.

“How do you know?” Rickon demanded. “He’s very fast.”

“He is,” Bryen agreed, “but a man must keep his center if he’s to go on the offensive. That man would do better to resist the blows, though he is the weaker opponent, rather than put himself out of balance.”

The shield was beginning to remind Rickon of Maggon Magos, and he was surprised to find that it did not irritate him as much as he would have thought.

They watched the men fight, Robert cheering along with the rest while Rickon echoed all the insults he heard shouted around the ring. Robert glared at him when he did that, but Rickon didn’t care. The fighters rotated, a stream of men joining and leaving and joining again. The soldiers had tasks to attend to, but all of them came for a few minutes at least to watch and cheer, preparing for the night to come.

The sky was dark gray, the woods darkening to craggy black silhouettes behind them when Robert pulled on his arm, demanding they head back to the tent as Sansa had told them.

“Wait, they’re almost done!” Rickon protested. He pointed at the last two fighters circling each other restlessly in the dusk. Shaggy grunted and lay down behind him, bored.

“Time to go, boys.” Rickon felt a heavy hand on his shoulder as Bryen steered him back toward camp. “Lady Sansa will be waiting for you.”

Rickon groaned and tried to turn back, but the shield laid both hands on his shoulders, pushing him forcefully on his way while Robert hurried alongside them.

They had just turned around the treeline when they heard the confused drumming of approaching hooves. Bryen laid a hand on each of them. The camp was a flurry of activity. Men huddled into formations, and captains shouted from horseback about them. A long line of mounted soldiers spilled down the slope and around the bend in the direction they had just come from, northward.

“What’s happening?” Bryen called out.

“They’ve seen us!” a man shouted back. “They’re running, the bloody cowards!”

“Damnit,” Bryen muttered. He pushed the boys ahead of him, nearly running toward their tent.

“They’ve seen us!” Rickon twisted back to peer at Ser Bryen. “The Boltons could be getting away!”

“Move, boy,” he snarled, sloshing through the wet snow as soldiers marched around them in the opposite direction.

“The tent is right there,” Rickon pointed. “We can get back on our own. You should go!”

Bryen looked over his shoulder at the line of soldiers disappearing over the hill into the darkening woods.

“We’ll be fine,” Robert piped in. “You should be with the soldiers.”

The shield cursed, already backing up a few steps. “Go straight to your sister!” he ordered. “Don’t stop to talk to anyone!” They nodded, and he turned, running up the hill.

Robert started toward the tent, a hundred yards ahead of them. “Good Lord Robert is probably hungry,” he said. Rickon followed slowly. Shaggydog paced docilely at his side, snowy fur brushing his elbow. He threaded his fingers through Shaggy’s mane and stopped, peering into the woods.

“What are you doing?” Robert had turned to find him ten yards behind.

“I just want to watch,” Rickon said, edging closer to the woods.

“Rickon!” Robert said, eyes widening.

“I’ll be with Shaggy, I'll be fine,” Rickon said soothingly. “I’m just going to watch, I won’t do anything.”

“Rickon, don’t!” Robert yelled when he turned and sprinted for the treeline, Shaggy on his heels.

“I’ll be fine!” he called back and jumped over a thick cluster of roots, the trees’ overhanging limbs covering him in darkness.

He crunched through the snow, following the slope up toward the clearing. He watched the foot soldiers as they marched past, and crept through the trees, one hand in Shaggy’s fur. When he reached the bend where trees gave way to the clearing, he yanked hard to retrieve his spear where he had stuck it behind a slanting, gnarled trunk for safe-keeping.

Soldiers milled in the clearing where the sparring grounds stood, bottlenecked as they poured onto the road, a thousand dark ants crawling forward into a long, ordered line. Captains and torchbearers sat their horses all around the perimeter, flames glowing hotly against the deepening night.

Rickon walked carefully around the clearing toward the road. He thought these woods were familiar, but it was too dark to be sure. He crept fifty yards away from where the soldiers were crossing and looked through the branches to the other side. He took a deep breath and darted across, a small quick shadow unnoticed by the men marching ahead of him. His feet crunched into the woods on the western side, and he stopped, breathing hard, exhilarated by his success.

_They’re going to Winterfell_ , Rickon thought, _and I won’t wait behind._ He found his direwolf standing steadily beside him and he grasped Shaggy’s ear, then continued forward, shadowing the men marching northward, invisible in the wooded darkness.

He started to run, wondering if he would reach the men at the front of the line. He wanted to be the first to march on Winterfell. He ran and ran, the icy breeze burning against his cheeks, the flames from the torches on his right slipping by in a blur of bright gold.

A horn blew just as he reached the forest’s northern edge. Rickon halted, panting frozen breaths, and gazed upon the open hills that he knew stretched one hundred yards to the gates of Winterfell.

Shadows hulked atop the walls, and giant cups of flames Rickon had never seen before were stationed at each joint and corner. He saw long dark tentacles bending back and up before releasing sprays of sharp little darts that arced and pricked the cold ground.

An angry buzzing grew louder and louder as Sansa’s army approached slowly. The horn blew again, closer now, and silence swept over the soldiers as a voice from the vanguard rose in the night, its shouting indistinct but vehement. The voice rose and fell, punctuated with jeers and laughter, until the sound of a horn blasted over the fields for the third time, and a roar rolled slowly from the front of the line to the back, and Rickon knew it had begun.

The pounding of hooves jolted him into action, and he flew from the branches into the snowy field, running harder and faster than he ever had before, running back to Winterfell. The soldiers cheered him on, Shaggy streaking up and down the hills alongside him. He pushed his spear over his head and yelled.

Before he knew what was happening, he was surrounded by clashing swords and shrieking metal. A man snarled curses filthier than any Rickon had heard before, another grunted incoherently, two more yelled commands back and forth, and sharp steel swung heedlessly around his head. He ducked behind a tall black stallion, but the horse twisted, its rider pulling sharply as he slashed at a man’s outstretched arm, a spray of blood spattering Rickon’s face, a never-ending agonizing scream piercing his ears.

Rickon turned and ran, keeping the walls to his left. He darted around clusters of mounted soldiers circling the enemy, he ran past a man fighting while a knife protruded from his chest, and another with one in his eye. He saw heads turn when he flew by and thought he heard his name called, but he ran and ran, veering closer and closer to Winterfell, until a sharp rap on the back of his head brought him to his knees, stars in his eyes.

“One of the bitch’s brats!” Rickon blinked and looked up at a man with graying jowls and watery blue eyes squatting in front of him. He held a short ugly knife in Rickon’s face and peered about excitedly.

“Ben!” the man shrieked, jowls quivering. “Bring them ‘ere, Ben!”

Rickon shot to his feet, but the ugly man tackled him, slamming his face into the snow. He yanked a handful of hair and pulled Rickon to his knees, squeezing his wrists together behind his back. Rickon spat snow and tried to blink the moisture from his eyes, but the man gripped his hair even tighter. “Keep still, brat,” the man growled at him, warm, rancid breath washing over Rickon’s cheek.

“What is it?” a gruff voice demanded irritably. Rickon looked up and saw a pillar of flame burning on the wall’s eastern corner. He was not ten feet from Winterfell.

“It’s one o’ them boys!” the man howled. “Where’s Ramsay?”

“He ran,” the man grunted and spat on the ground. A large brown dog appeared at the man’s feet. Five more silhouettes prowled in the fog, restless and tense.

“Ramsay ran?” the ugly man repeated, mouth gaping stupidly to reveal a row of cracked yellowing teeth.

“Not an hour after the news came, the bloody bastard,” the other man responded. He peered down at Rickon. “Roose might have a use for him. Get him up.”

The ugly man yanked Rickon to his feet. Without thinking, Rickon smashed his fist across the man’s temple. He squawked and hissed and dropped his arm. Rickon ran. He heard the men yelling at each other, and then a high-pitched whistling, followed by short, guttural yelps. He heard barking, and pushed his legs harder.

Something glinted in gray snow at his feet. Rickon stooped to retrieve Maggon Magos’ spear. He looked over his shoulder and saw the tall man and his dogs twenty feet behind him. Rickon turned a quick, sharp circle and flung the spear. He thought he heard a hoarse scream, and then a warm boulder slammed into him, knocking him off his feet, his head bouncing off a rock hidden in the snow.

The hound snapped in his face, the others circling menacingly. Rickon was angry enough to scream, but he lay still as they sniffed at him, prowling like they were waiting for something.

_They’re so stupid, even Good Lord Robert could run circles around them,_ Rickon thought, disgusted _._ _Don’t they know what wolves do to dogs?_ Unable to lay still any longer, he sprang up and made to run, but the sharp snap of teeth in his ankle made him scream and fall back to the snow.

The dogs swarmed, unleashed. Rickon drew out his shortsword with both hands and swung it about recklessly. He connected twice, saw a black spray spurting from one’s neck. Shaggydog jumped from the fog, a matted black beast with angry yellow eyes. The mutts hesitated, growling. Rickon stood on shaky legs and stabbed one of the dogs between the eyes, leaning his full weight on the blade.

A voice called behind him. Rickon turned and saw a soldier riding toward him. It was the man who had fought two opponents on the sparring grounds that day. Rickon grasped at the man’s outstretched hand and pulled himself up on the horse behind him.

“What are you doing out here?” the man shouted as they galloped away.

Rickon looked back into the deepening darkness where he had left Shaggy to finish the battle. He closed his eyes, and the tang of hot blood filled his mouth, tendons snapping between his jaws, while the remaining mongrels flagged and backed away.

He saw her bright red hair through thick fog as they rode to the edge of the battle. She kicked her horse forward when she saw him, eyes bright.

“Rickon!” she cried. “Where have you been? I thought- what has happened to you?” she asked, distressed, looking at the blood on his clothes, the mud and bruises on his face.

“I’m fine,” he said, embarrassed in spite of himself.

“You’re hurt,” she said. “Are you in pain, Rickon?”

“No,” he lied bravely and cursed the waver in his voice.

She turned to the man in front of him. “Thank you,” she said. “What is your name, Ser?”

The man cleared his throat uncomfortably. “I’m called Frederick Ryman,” he said a bit hoarsely, “but I’m not a ser, my lady.”

A queer look passed her face. “No indeed,” she said. She outstretched her hand. “Thank you, Frederick Ryman,” she said seriously. “I will not forget this.”

He narrowed his eyes at her, but grasped her hand briefly before nodding politely and dismounting.

“My lady,” he said once more, then turned and disappeared into the thickening fog.

Sansa took the reins of Rickon’s horse, guiding both mounts forward slowly.

“What were you thinking, Rickon?” she hissed so only he could hear. “I have only just got you back, and you run off on me like this?”

“I didn’t plan to,” he said defensively. “I saw the walls again, and it just happened.”

They trotted another few paces, Sansa regarding him closely. “Let’s see your sword,” she said suddenly.

“What?” he asked, surprised.

“Let’s see it,” she demanded, and he slid the blade from its sheath. Dark, sticky blood coated the sword from tip to handle.

“Whose blood is that?” she asked.

“Just some dogs,” he responded grudgingly. “Some old man tried to take me inside. When I ran, he set his dogs on me. I’m pretty sure I got him with my spear, though.”

Sansa nodded grimly. She peered into the gloom behind him. “Looks like Shaggy got the rest,” she said, pointing. Rickon turned and saw his wolf sidle out of the fog to trot alongside Rickon’s horse.

Sansa side-eyed him. “I want to take that sword away from you,” she declared. When Rickon opened his mouth to protest, she sighed. “I can’t, I know. At least you have a mind how to use it.”

“I do,” he said. “I should respect the hunt, Sansa, I know, but I wanted to be the first to enter Winterfell again.”

“Well, then,” she said, and turned back to the party following them. “Robert,” she called. Their cousin rode forward solemnly, and Sansa beckoned him to her left side. “The battle is nearly over,” she told them. “More than two thousand ran away, unsurprisingly the majority of them Freys. The rest are so outnumbered, I expect they dropped their swords and begged for mercy, right in front of Lord Skinflayer.” She winked at Rickon. “Bronze Yohn has already subdued the inner walls, so you won’t be first, exactly. But you can go ahead of me.”

Rickon looked back, confused. She gestured in front of herself. The soldiers drew back as they rode forward, and Rickon spurred his horse to the front of the line. Gray light was just beginning to break over the horizon as he led the northern army under the gates to Winterfell.


	14. Sansa VII

Sansa looked upon the ruined walls of Winterfell washed in warm morning light, and wept.

Ser Davos stood by and commiserated in her ear. “You will rebuild, m’lady,” he said. “Winterfell will see another spring.”

Her gaze swept over the courtyard where she had played as a girl. A mess of sodding debris cluttered every corner, black craters punctured the inner walls, a wet jumbled heap where sprawling stables had stood. She looked up and saw her mother standing in the library window, watching the boys pelting each other with snowballs. All that stood of the library tower now was a blackened shell riddled with holes. She turned away and brushed cold tears from her cheek.

“We will rebuild,” Sansa agreed, pulling her cloak tighter around herself. “And we will harvest the weirwoods.”

Ser Davos squinted at her in response. She pushed past him to circle the jagged skeleton of Winterfell’s glass gardens. Sansa wasn’t sure why the man was at her heels so early. The army was still asleep, a ring of quiet camps guarding her and Winterfell. The men had celebrated their victory in the cold dead of night, stationed once again in a new place. The enemy had not been so exuberant, Sansa knew.

“Any word from Ser Marlon?” the sailor asked her politely.

“No,” she said, “but it will not be long. Once the trials are finished, we can start with the real work.”

“Lady Sansa,” Ser Davos began hesitantly. Sansa tightened her jaw, steeling herself. “How is your brother?” he asked.

She looked at him suspiciously. “Rickon will be fine,” she answered. “He and my cousin have taken today to rest, to prepare for the days ahead.”

“You mean to make them part of it, then, m’lady?” Ser Davos groped at some phantom cord around his neck. “Part of the spectacle?”

Sansa’s lip curled. “You say it like I have some other option,” she said resentfully.

Ser Davos looked away, hands fidgeting at his pockets. “I grew to know your brother on our journey together, as much as anyone can know that boy. Rickon is reckless and angry, but honest, too, and fierce. He’s seen too much blood already. He’s a _child_.”

“As am I, ser,” Sansa said. “I know how you look at me.” Ser Davos’ eyes flicked quickly over her face. She swallowed. “I know how all these men, my _soldiers_ , look at me. When the world refuses to see you as a child, can you really afford to act like one?”

Ser Davos looked away to the tower that had contained her father’s solar. “I lost five sons in the Battle of Blackwater Bay,” he said, his voice calm and steady, as empty as a hollow well. “I should have kept them safe.”

“No one can stop a war on their doorstep,” she said. The winds picked up, and their faces turned as one to catch the cold breeze. “Tell me of your Red Woman.”

“Not mine,” he returned angrily. “She found King Stannis and turned him from the Seven. He burned his gods on Dragonstone, and has found no peace since.”

“How did she find him?” Sansa asked. “Had she been looking for him?”

Ser Davos shook his head irritably, as if to flick away a pesky fly. “I don’t know. I don’t know what is truth, and what are lies. She calls him Azor Ahai, she says he is the Hero reborn to save the world from coming darkness. It is an old prophecy among the Red Priests,” he explained. “A warrior born amidst salt and smoke to wield a sword of light against the armies of winter.”

“Armies of winter?” Sansa repeated dully, a knot sinking in her stomach. “She believes they are the Others?”

Ser Davos shrugged, reaching out a hand to brush snow from smoky black glass. “The crows think so. It may be. She has power,” he admitted, “and she thinks she fights for the light.”

“It must be nice to see so clearly,” Sansa said.

Ser Davos snorted, shoulders rising and lowering again, slightly more relaxed than before.

“A warrior born amidst salt and smoke,” she mused thoughtfully. “A hero reborn.”

“It were Stannis she saw in her fires, so she traveled across the world to find him,” Ser Davos said.

“If the fire showed her something, some _one_ else,” Sansa said, “would she change her mind?”

He studied her. “Melisandre listens to none but her god.”

Sansa nodded. Gray fog swirled about them and through the broken glass gardens. She met his eyes again. “It _must_ be a spectacle,” she said. “The North is owed it.”

He dipped his head, shoulders stooped, and turned toward the godswood. Sansa felt disappointed, and then wondered why, before she turned as well toward Winterfell’s keep.

Wyman Manderly was not happy with Barbrey Dustin.

“Three months!” he wheezed, one fat finger trembling as he pointed it at her. “I send you to rouse White Harbor’s forces, and you are gone _three months_?”

“ _You_ sent me, you inflated whale?” Lady Dustin bristled. “I left to find a solution for the North, _not_ for Wyman Manderly! Besides, what are you blubbering about? It appears to me you are still alive.”

“Barely,” he groused. “Do you know what those cowards did to me?”

“I heard what you did for them,” Barbrey said, mouth twitching.

Lord Manderly smacked his lips and leaned back heavily against the oak headboard, splotches of gray stretching across his starched shirt where he sweat through it. “They never forget my pies,” he smiled, folding his hands contentedly across his great belly.

Sansa’s mind turned to Donella Hornwood locked in a tower, and a voice whispered “ _justice_ ” in her ear, though she wasn’t sure how what happened to Donella Hornwood and what Lord Manderly had done were related. She cleared her throat.

“Lord Manderly,” she said, stepping to Barbrey’s side by the bed. “Lady Dustin found me and brought your cousin Ser Marlon to the Vale to escort me back to the North. My brother Rickon, Lord of Winterfell, and I would not be home now without her help.”

“Lady Sansa,” he tilted his head obsequiously, “I would kiss your hand, if you let me, and rise to the occasion, if I still could.” Barbrey snorted. “Don’t be unseemly, Lady Dustin,” Lord Manderly said with false concern, “the girl is a child.”

“She is, and she isn’t,” Barbrey returned. “She’s received worse talk than yours, I’m sure.”

Sansa smiled uncomfortably. “I met your son, my lord. His family welcomed me to White Harbor and returned my brother to me.”

Lord Manderly leaned forward, breathing heavily, his hand clutching at his throat hidden under his many chins. “They cut me open for those pies, you know. All because I said it was a blessing the boy died, so he wouldn’t grow up like the rest of them. They did worse for _my_ boy. They caged him for weeks with no food, but threw him an arm or some other chunk when they needed it cleaned up. Not even _fresh_. Spoiled, rotten.”

She leaned away from him and his gray shirt and crumpled sheets covered in crumbs. She closed her eyes and forced herself to breathe through her nose.

She opened her eyes and saw them watching her. Sansa wondered if either of them would think to apologize, then pushed the notion away as ridiculous.

“I thought your son was Roose Bolton’s prisoner,” she said.

“Who can keep track?” the man shrugged, shifting from side to side to stretch his legs. The bed creaked frighteningly with each sway. “Tywin Lannister, Roose Bolton, Gregor Clegane... different captains, the only ones who stayed the same were the Freys.”

“I ordered them kept under guard in White Harbor,” she said.

His flabby cheeks stretched generously into a wide smile at that. “And what am I to do with them?” he asked, licking his lips.

“Stannis will return to the Wall soon enough,” Sansa mused. “They can join him, if they wish.”

Barbrey hissed, and Wyman’s hands clenched into thick fists as he stared at her. “You don’t mean that,” he spat.

Sansa sighed. “Would you have me bake them into pies?”

“Can you cook?” Barbrey sneered at her.

She looked at the pair of them, their angry eyes and hungry mouths. “I will give you blood for three days,” she said. “And then, it stops. It stops in Winterfell, in Barrowton, and White Harbor, too.”

Wyman Manderly leaned back again, regarding her. “I’ve been holed up with the bastards for five months now. Three days is not enough for these rats.”

“Almost all the Freys are gone from Winterfell,” she told him. “They knew of our approach and rode out before we arrived. Two thousand got away, headed westward.”

He stared at her as if she were an idiot. “Then ride them down, and kill them! You bring an army to Winterfell, and allow Freys to run free in the North?”

“They are riding straight for Stannis,” she said. “By all accounts, he has twice their number.”

“Stannis! They murdered your brother, and you want _Stannis_ to finish them off?”

“It’s been three years since I left the North, Lord Manderly,” she said crisply. “I’m really rather sick of Southerners, and just now I have a host of Boltons to hang.”

“Your sister is gone,” Wyman told her. “Escaped some weeks ago with that creature, Theon Turncloak. Might be dead, might be with Stannis. Or might still be out there, in the woods.”

Sansa paused. She’d never really believed that Arya would be at Winterfell. Arya was far away in a cave full of faces. Sansa wondered now why she hadn’t considered what was to be done with Theon Greyjoy and Ramsay Bolton’s bride.

“Three days,” she said again. “Then we ride to meet Stannis. And if he needs help finishing them off, we’ll help him.”

Lord Manderly shook his head and looked up at her almost kindly. “My lady, you are not old enough to be Regent. You should leave these affairs to one of your lords, until your brother comes of age.”

“Are you volunteering?” she asked him, fighting back the urge to sneer like Lady Dustin. “I’m sure my men will rejoice to hear Lord Lamprey has taken the helm.”

“Three thousand of your men are _mine_ ,” he reminded her. “And better Lord Lamprey than Lady Lannister.”

How long would the name sting? “Winterfell is my home, and the North is my country,” she declared, lifting her chin. “I have been a prisoner for three years, and now people follow me. They want to believe in something, they want to believe that they can be saved, that something still exists worth fighting for. The _North_ is worth fighting for, but our enemy now is winter. I can put up a fight against winter. I am a Stark, after all.”

Lord Manderly nodded almost imperceptibly as he leaned against the headboard. “And what is your plan, Lady Stark?”

“I’m working out the details,” she admitted. “The next three days will firmly establish our alliances this winter. I would like you both to sit as council with me.”

Lady Dustin nodded at that, a wide smile cracking her dry lips. “I’ll vote them all guilty.”

“I know,” Sansa said stiffly. “Have no fear. It’s only a ritual. They all will hang.”

Manderly grunted. “There’s no blood to hangings. I thought the Stark way was to swing the sword yourself.”

“Don’t be a fool,” she said, turning for the door. “And don’t fool yourself; pies are not justice.”

“What does a girl like that know about pies?” she heard him grumble as she snapped the door shut behind her.

The soldiers had begun to rouse when she walked outside again an hour after breakfast.

“Have your men build a pier,” she told Ser Templeton outside the south gate, on the field they had marched across the night before. “A large one.”

Bronze Yohn had split the enemy into four camps, taken their weapons and rid them of armor, set a guard of mounted soldiers ready to ride down any deserters. “Only a few tried to fight,” he told her, “and we put a quick end to them.”

The Bolton men were quiet and sullen. They sat in clumps and circles, arms crossed against the bitter cold. Sansa looked at face after face, and all were hungry, weary, weak. Her men stalked among them, knives glinting in their hands, swords hanging menacingly from their belts. Once in a while a prisoner would turn his head after a guard had passed and spit on the ground. It was the only show of spirit she saw.

“How many are left?” she asked.

“Close on two thousand,” Lord Royce told her. “A third fled, a third died, and a third are here, wishing they had done as the others.”

“What of the commanders?” she asked.

“I have locked those still alive in the dungeon below Winterfell, my lady. Nearly fifty men, crammed into four cells. The last I gave to Roose Bolton.”

Sansa had never been to the dungeon at Winterfell. She had never seen anyone die or starve or freeze before she had gone South, but she didn’t say as much to Bronze Yohn.

“I have heard that Roose Bolton’s wife traveled with him to Winterfell,” she said. “And that she is pregnant.”

“She is,” Bronze Yohn answered. “She is under guard with my men in the First Keep.”

“Thank you, Lord Royce,” she said. “I will speak to them now.”

“My lady-” he started.

“I will be quick,” she reassured him.

She stood in front of the first mass of huddled men. Lord Royce and Ser Templeton were mounted behind her with twenty horsed soldiers behind them. Five hundred more circled the prisoners, another thousand ears pricked across the hilly fields clogged with her soldiers’ encampments.

“I know you are Bolton men,” she said, and they stared at her with dead eyes. “Most of you have been Bolton men all your lives; loyal, hardworking people. You are Bolton men, but soon there will be no more Boltons. What will that make you?”

They made no moves to respond. A few turned their heads to whisper together.

“Northmen,” she answered for them. “You’ll be dead, or you’ll be alive, but you’ll be Northmen, not Boltons. You know what we are up against. Not just cold or hunger, though those will kill us too. You know there is a common enemy that walks when winter falls.” She paused. “You know why we must burn the dead that fell here last night.”

Runestone soldiers looked at her like she had gone mad, but the Northmen leaned forward, listening.

“I will not spare your commanders,” she continued. “But you have a choice now, where they do not. You can die today with them. Your body will be burnt afterward. You can join Lord Stannis, who marches against the true enemy at the Wall, and fight for the lives of your family and countrymen. Or you can join me. I am not going to battle, but I need good men. We have little time to rebuild, to open lines of trade between our Houses so that supplies may flow freely through the North, to your wives and children, your brothers and neighbors.”

A few sneered at her, others turned away. A thin man with black hair and bloody eyes raised his hand at her obscenely. But most just sat and stared, hunched over against a wet cold breeze rising over the hills.

“It’s cold as hell here,” she cried, lifting her face to the wind, “but we are bred for winter. Our ancestors survived a thousand winters, and we are what’s left of them. Let them keep their petty wars and Southern squabbles.”

She looked at them, their sullen, accusing eyes. “Any man who likes his choices for life may eat,” she said, waving forward carts of salted pork, hot broth and hard bread. Dead men came to life, licking their lips at the steam wafting toward them. “Those who would rather die than fight for the North, be quick about it, for we have work to do.”

More than a few kept their distance, sour, arms crossed against the wind, but their fellows returned with strips of pork and cups of hot soup, and twenty minutes later there was not a man among them who had not risen and accepted the meal.

In the second group, one man stood and shouted _‘whore’_ , ruddy face twisted as he pointed a finger at her. Two of her soldiers stepped forward and took his arms, a third quickly slit his throat. The man fell to his knees, clutching his neck. Blood sprayed the slushy gray snow in a semicircle around him. He was slow in dying, and noisy too, but the others stepped over him where he twitched to stand in line for their soup.

The first two groups were pulling bodies from the ground and piling them in heaps upon the warming pier, the third group still eating, when a riot broke out among the fourth.

“We don’t follow some cunt!” a greasy man with open boils on his face cried out, gnashing his chipped brown teeth. “Let’s watch her run from _my_ bitches, see if she puts up a good fight!”

An old man with an angry red gash down his cheek stood as well, a one-armed man with black eyes, a boy with straw-colored hair of an age with her, and another with her father’s cold brown gaze, and another, and another, and another. The angry buzzing grew to a crescendo, and soon there was shouting between her soldiers and the crowd. The circle tightened around them, pushing the prisoners back into a hive of fuming bees. She watched the one-armed man pick up a jagged stone and lob it at the line of soldiers choking them back. It hit a man of middling age in the temple. He went down and the soldiers roared, their screams and clashing swords raucous and confused.

Sansa stood, aghast, as men shouted and pointed and ran, and blood sprayed thick and fast.

“ _Stop_!” she screamed. “They’re not all fighting- _stop_!” She took a step forward, but a thick arm slid around her collarbone and pulled her back. She turned and saw Bronze Yohn’s white beard and wrinkled cheek above her head, pulling her away from the chaos. “They have to stop!” she cried. “Most of them would join us-”

Clammy fingers locked around her wrist, and Sansa felt herself pulled in opposing directions. A gaunt, splotchy face scowled at her from above, two more figures leering in on either side. The gaunt man grimaced, a purple tongue flicking between his lips, and he slashed at Bronze Yohn’s arm, the point dipping where the metal met at the joint of his elbow. Sansa heard his surprised grunt and felt a warm pulsing spray down her chest. The gaunt man slashed again, a bee sting in her throat, and she screamed when the two men on either side hurtled at her, knocking her to the ground.

There was a flurry of hands and elbows. She kicked blindly, her hair in her eyes. _So many times_ , she thought furiously, _so many times they’ve tried to kill me._

A humid breath fogged her ear. “We’ll take your pretty white clothes,” the man grunted, thick fingers tugging on the brooch at her throat, “and watch you run through them fields from my dogs.”

She reared up and locked her teeth around the apple in his gullet. There was too much gristle to tear clean through, but she sank a few layers deep, the hot, metallic juice familiar on her tongue. The man yelled and smashed his fist across her temple, but she wrapped her arms around his neck like a lover and bit down harder at his throat. _I know this_ , she thought strangely.

The man moaned and stilled, suddenly growing heavy on top of her. Sansa pushed her hands against his shoulders and shoved him off, quickly swiping the back of her arm across her face. Bronze Yohn yanked his sword from the man’s back. She spat a mouthful of hot blood, scooped a handful of snow and pressed it against her lips, washing away the traces of her savagery.

“Did they see?” she breathed harshly.

Lord Royce flicked a cursory look around them. Three men lay dead, holes in their torsos leaking dark red in the snow. Another hundred bodies, or two hundred perhaps, were scattered where the angry beehive had buzzed moments before, the rest on their knees thirty yards back, swords at their heads on all sides. Bronze Yohn’s gaze stopped behind her, where her mounted guard stood.

“Yes,” he said quietly, and held out a hand to lift her to her feet.

“Feed them,” Sansa urged and dragged herself to her horse. She jumped and swung her leg over the mare, limbs trembling, stomach tight. She swiped at her mouth and chin again, but the man’s blood had seeped down her cloak and bodice.

“Feed them!” she ordered, kicking the mare forward where three hundred men knelt in the snow, surrounded. “You’ll eat!” she shouted at them. “And then you’ll clean up this mess! Throw the bodies on the pier, and jump in yourself if you can’t imagine life without your precious leech lord! What has he done for you? What has his miserable son done for you? Are you all men who would let your daughters be ripped apart by dogs for sport? _Do you know what wolves do to dogs_?” She leaned her head back, fighting a scream. She yanked the reins and the mare whipped around, the cut at her throat burning in the wind.

Twenty more died that day while she watched. The first captain sneered that they were bloodless cowards unable to finish the job on the battlefield. They found him guilty. The second said nothing, empty eyes glued to the ground at their feet. They found him guilty. The third cried and begged and said that he’d had no choice, that Roose Bolton was his liege and the only lord to feed his family when the snows set in, and they found him guilty, too.

They hanged them five at a time. The first round went smoothly, bodies dangling limp and quiet above them all in a row. Two of the next five were louder. They twitched and kicked from the noose, crying strangled little moans. Sansa watched their eyes jerk frantically about the crowd arrayed below them. Eight hundred soldiers and townspeople crammed inside the great hall’s ruined walls, while another two thousand circled outside, peering through the end that stood broken and open to the elements. She pulled the executioners aside after that and urged them to take care that the ropes were tight.

“Justice should be swift,” she told them. _Justice is a fraud_ , she thought, _like me_.

The men died all day, and the fire burned all night.

On the morning of the second day, she entered the great hall with Rickon bandaged and limping and Robert stiff and pale. She didn’t eat anything that day and did not force the boys to either. When she thought about her little brother seated at her right and her sweet cousin watching on her left, and her between them, delivering judgment as though she were a god, she felt ill, so she did not think about it much at all.

They hanged another twenty men that day. Rickon vomited afterward, climbing the winding steps to his bed chamber. Sansa did not hear about it until later that evening from one of the maids. She set the White Harbor men about harvesting the godswood, ordered rations for the following day, drank three glasses of wine and fell into an uneasy sleep.

It was late in the afternoon of the third day when he knelt before her.

He was thinner than she had imagined, a watery wisp of a man. His pale face was bruised across his right jaw, his trousers filthy, his black shirt matted and ripped. Thin, colorless lips set in a straight line as he looked at her, strange pale eyes regarding her calmly.

“Roose Bolton,” she said, “you’ve lost your cloak.”

He said nothing, only watched her almost curiously.

“Bring him his cloak!” she called out. “Lord Bolton needs his colors. I imagine your wife is pleased with so much pink,” she commented. His lips curled at that, but still he made no response.

Roose Bolton’s cloak was produced, and Ser Templeton pinned it around his neck. The red droplets fluttered when a cold wind blew through the broken walls and around the great hall.

“That’s better,” she said. “Now we can really see you.”

“You look just like your mother,” he said finally.

 _Don’t you dare speak of her_ , Sansa thought. Her temple throbbed where the gaunt man had hit her, her blackened wound reopened, hidden under her hair.

“Stark and Lannister,” he continued, his voice thin and reedy, “but you look like a Tully, and seat an Arryn at your side. It must be a challenge to remember who you are.”

“I am Winterfell’s daughter,” she answered, her voice clear, ringing through the hall. “I am the Maiden of the North, the King’s sister.”

“You’re a wild wolf,” he said, “who has confused vengeance with justice, just like your brother.”

Sansa stared down at the man. She was irritated to note how well pink suited his complexion.

“I’m a wolf, you’re a leech,” she said. “And what is your son?”

“A monster,” he shrugged. “Another brother of yours now, since he married your sister.”

An indistinct noise escaped her throat. “Roose Bolton,” she snapped, “if you’ve ever in your miserable life done anything for the good of the North, tell it now.”

He looked up at her, his eyes two moons set deep in his hard pale face. “I killed the King,” he smiled. “Your brother led us South, eight in ten to their deaths. It was time to end, so I ended it.”

Silence followed his words, the crowd shifting on their feet, eyes turning from him to Sansa.

“I see,” she said. She stood slowly from the seat where her father had held court.

“Roose Bolton,” she said again, “You murdered my brother and mother, but that is not why you are here. You planned a massacre for a wedding and connived with Lannisters to ensure a Southron victory, but that is not why you are here. You turned your cloak and killed your soldiers, your own men, so that you could call yourself Warden of the North. But that is not why you are here, either.” She gazed at him and thought he looked small, surrounded by her soldiers. “You are here because I won and you lost.”

His eyes narrowed, face twisting. He clenched his jaw and spat a giant, runny glob at her feet.

 _Is that it_? Sansa thought distantly, a savage victory coursing in her veins. _Is that all you have for me?_

“Get him up!” she yelled suddenly, half the court jumping in surprise, a thrill reverberating through the hall with her ringing tones.

She beckoned Robert and Rickon and swept down the stone steps. His face lifted as she passed, and she heard the cold clink of metal chains as the guards pushed him to fall in step behind her.

The crowd parted as she climbed over the blackened rubbish of the great hall’s outer wall and stalked through the courtyard. She did not have to turn to know they spilled out the south gate behind her, the cold white sky breaking where gold light fought its way through the clouds.

“Rickon,” she said, barely turning her head over her right shoulder, “Do you have your shortsword?”

“Y-yes,” he replied, hurrying to keep up with her swift pace, “but- but I can’t...”

“Don’t worry, Rickon,” she said, looking straight ahead at the columns of tents spotting the rolling fields. “I’ll take care of everything.”

The crowd spilled over the hills behind her, a low hum thrumming excitedly. She marched between encampments and took to the road heading south, to the clearing where they had stationed before riding on Winterfell. The crowd grew as Runestone men, Heart’s Home, White Harbor, all flowed in and joined, curious at the commotion.

On the eastern edge of the clearing was a small, fragile-looking weirwood, its white roots clawing through the dirt of a rocky hill. Sansa climbed the slope and turned, townspeople edging to the front while row upon row of soldiers spilled into the clearing and ringed around the ledge. Robert and Rickon stood behind her, Roose Bolton dragged up to her right, his feet slipping on the wet ice.

“Winter is coming,” she called, her voice picked up and swept away by a swift breeze. “Many say it as already here. Long days lay ahead, long days and hard choices. But after winter comes the spring, and the North will still be here. The North endures!” She turned to Lord Bolton where he kneeled behind a wide white root. “This man has forgotten that. This man saw no hope for the North, so he turned against his brothers and grasped what power he could to save his own skin. But this man is wrong.”

She turned back to the crowd, old men with leathery faces, hard women, young boys perched on their fathers’ shoulders. “When winter comes, the lone wolf dies, but the pack survives. Roose Bolton is a murderer. He turned against his King and his men, he killed my brother and my mother, he allowed his son to commit unspeakable acts against fellow Northmen and women, but more than all that, he lost faith in the North!” She faced him, and he did not meet her eyes but stared down at the white roots tangled about his knees. “That is the charge we put before you, Roose Bolton,” she said. “It is the charge of wolves, and we have found you guilty.”

She lifted an outstretched palm to Rickon, and he slid his shortsword from its scabbard and placed it carefully in her grasp. She beckoned Ser Templeton to stand behind her. He put his arms around her carefully, taking the weight of the sword in his grasp. Bronze Yohn Royce pushed Roose Bolton’s wrists behind his back and forced his head down upon the root. He clenched his milky white eyes shut, and Sansa heard a ragged breath escape him.

She looked down at his exposed neck. She felt suddenly uncertain, the blade awkward in her shared grip with Ser Templeton. _What if I cannot do it_?

She brought her arms high above her head and felt Ser Templeton's steadying breath on her kneck. His tension released as they slammed the sword down, a high-pitched whistle the only sound in the world.

The tissues snapped, her joints rattling at the rough scrape of steel through bone. Sansa was jostled and felt a spray of blood on her cheek as Ser Templeton rose the sword again and hacked the last few tendons clean. Roose Bolton’s head rolled a few turns down the hill before it came to rest, propped against a rock covered in clean white snow.

Sansa thrust the sword in the air above her head. “The North remembers!” she screamed, while Roose Bolton’s blood dripped off the blade and crawled down her arm, dark red snakes staining the white sleeve of her dress.

“The North remembers!” she screamed again, and White Harbor men took up the call with her, lifting their own swords above their heads, stomping the frozen ground beneath their feet.

“The North remembers!” she screamed a third time, and they all screamed with her, Northmen and Vale soldiers alike, wizened old farmers from town, unwashed boys and young, straggly-haired girls, hardened gray women. She saw Wyman Manderly perched on an unlucky black courser, his wide mouth grinning as he turned and shouted. She saw Barbrey Dustin a few feet below her, her face lit up with a rare pure smile. The roar thrummed in her ears as she turned and grasped Rickon’s hand, thin red blood squeezing between their entwined fingers when she lifted it in the air. She flicked a quick smile at Robert, and her cousin swallowed and smiled uncertainly back at her, blue eyes wide.

The cold sun glared down on the clearing where they stood, ten thousand men, women and children shouting and stomping as the winter wind whistled through the forest all around them. Sansa looked down at the cold white earth drinking up Roose Bolton’s blood, and she felt briefly, gloriously whole.


	15. Jon IV

A cold breeze reflected off distant black waves and fluttered icy fingers through Jon’s hair. Quiet waves crashed steadily against the stone seawall. The salt in the air was so strong Jon could taste it.

“I’ve told you pieces of the prophecy foretelling Azor Ahai’s return,” Melisandre said behind him. Jon closed his eyes and willed away the pulsing in his temple. “Have you heard the story of how he forged his sword, Lightbringer?”

He didn’t turn around, but he could see her standing across the crackling fire all the same. The orange glow would soften her face, throw her dark eyes and lips in sharp contrast with her pale skin. Flames would flicker in her copper hair, highlighting the strands to gold. She would look like an angel of vengeance, pure and determined. He remained silent.

Clegane shifted beside him. “I’ve never heard it,” he said helpfully. Jon rolled his eyes.

“Azor Ahai felt his calling to wield a sword of light against the encroaching forces of darkness,” Melisandre said, her voice low and sweet. “He was born into an endless night, a world where children were stolen from their beds and creatures of ice and death stalked the greenlands. There are those who believe Azor Ahai was one of the children taken from his parents’ home to be a blood sacrifice to Winter’s King. Some say he was one of the lucky few who broke away from his captors by fortune’s will alone, and found a village who took pity on him and raised him as their own. Others say he grew angry and in his passion conjured flames to hold the dead at bay, and the very touch of his hand burned the dead creatures, shattering their icy armor, throwing their army of wights into confusion. Many say this is just a fanciful embellishment of an already fantastic story.”

“What of those who think it is just that, a story?” Jon was unable to stop himself. He could hear her gaze in the sputtering flames.

“Of course there are those who cannot believe,” she said lightly, “and more who choose not to, such as yourself. Stories are like rivers; they ebb and flow with the seasons, changing courses over the years, altering the landscape of the very world we live in with their constant, fluid power. You can stand just upstream of your companion, and neither of you will be standing in the same water.”

“And it’s a damn good thing, these mangy dogs we travel with,” Clegane grunted. No one laughed.

“Azor Ahai knew that he must forge a sword of blood and fire to defeat Winter’s King and hold the army of death at bay,” Melisandre continued. “So he worked for thirty days and thirty nights without rest to twist his steel into a weapon that would stand against death itself. When he was satisfied, he doused the sword in water, but no sooner had he submerged the blade but he knew it could not be Lightbringer. Victory against death takes more than fire, more than sweat. It takes more than hard work and good will. Sure enough, the blade shattered, and Azor Ahai was left to start again from nothing.”

“Nothing?” Jon snorted. “He’d the steel to make the first one, didn’t he? He had the tools and the flames, and he had the knowledge.”

“Yes, he had those things, Lord Snow,” Melisandre said, and Jon was perversely pleased at the haughty note of impatience in her voice. “I suppose I was indulging in a colloquial turn of phrase to emphasize a circumstance important in context of the larger moral narrative.”

“It’s the larger narrative that you’re concerned with, is it?” Jon antagonized, turning to peer at her through the fire. “If you’re so devoted to the moral of the story, why do you make the same moral error that storytellers throughout the ages have made? Why do you ignore the most innocent and unfairly treated character?”

Melisandre stared at him. The ruby ensconced between her collarbones flickered uncertainly. “Do you speak of Nissa Nissa?” she asked.

“Of course I do,” he retorted, “though scores of schoolchildren have undoubtedly felt more pity for the wolf, or the lion, or whatever the goddamn animal was that Azor Ahai slaughtered in his quest for a burning sword.”

“What the bloody hell are you two blathering on about?” Clegane demanded. Jon turned to him impatiently.

“Azor Ahai worked for fifty days and nights, or sixty days and nights, or however many days and nights the storyteller cares to make it, to forge his second sword, but instead of tempering it with water, he stabbed a wolf through the heart, or a lion, or a fucking mountain goat for all it matters to the _larger narrative_ , in order to temper the steel with blood.” Jon’s breath was coming fast, and his heart was pumping overtime. He didn’t know why he was so angry, but he was. “It didn’t serve, so Azor Ahai went to work on his third sword. This time, he knew that a larger sacrifice must be made to bring forth Lightbringer, so naturally, because he was a complete lunatic, he told his wife Nissa Nissa to kneel before him, and he plunged the blade through her breast. Thus, Azor Ahai murdered his wife and became a hero for the ages.”

Clegane grunted thoughtfully. “That sounds just about grotesque enough to appeal to a thousand years of storytellers.”

“The prophecy is _five_ thousand years old in Asshai,” Melisandre argued. “You have too little respect for the burdensome lives men led during the Long Night.”

“You have too little respect for Nissa Nissa’s sacrifice, for Nissa Nissa herself,” Jon said.

“Jon,” Melisandre pleaded, “there was no light, no hope, the only warmth they had was what they could draw from each other. Their struggles were insurmountable, their trials unbearable. Mothers drowned their children so as not to watch them starve to death. Women watched their husbands walk into the woods to protect their homes from the marching dead and knew they would be widows henceforth. If Azor Ahai could forge a sword that would strike down these agents of darkness and give hope to men to rise against them, was not his wife’s life a small price to pay, a small weight to hang in the balance of survival and annihilation?”

“How do you know it was Nissa Nissa’s blood that made the sword burn?” Jon demanded. “How do you know Azor Ahai wasn’t just tired of his wife and found Lightbringer later? How do you know he didn’t just make it all up?”

“It’s a story about a hero, Jon, not a down-and-out miscreant!” she cried.

“It doesn’t make sense,” he protested. “If it were a story about Nissa Nissa, and the path that led her to choose to sacrifice herself, it might be different. If it were a story about the hard life she lived, and the losses she endured, and the love she had for Azor Ahai that drove her to give up her life so he could save the world from the same pain she endured, then I could understand it. But then it would be Nissa Nissa’s story, and Nissa Nissa would be the five thousand year old hero.”

Melisandre shook her head. Color had risen high on her cheeks. “We have the stories we have, Jon.”

“Well, they’re terrible,” Jon groused and turned his back. Water crashed against moldy black rock, and the Nightwatch’s feeble flotilla of ships rocked with the waves.

“I agree with the bastard,” Clegane said unexpectedly. Jon wondered if he would ever again be with people who didn’t deliberately try to provoke him. “No hero would murder the woman he loved,” he rasped, “but then again, there are no real heroes and all men are cunts.”

“Your astute commentary is invaluable, as always,” Jon said dryly.

Melisandre looked between the two of them. Jon thought she was almost bewildered. “Neither of you think that Azor Ahai was justified?” she asked. “Given that he led an army of men to defeat the encroaching darkness with the Red Sword of Heroes?”

“If our hero bought his strength with blood coerced from his innocent wife,” Clegane rasped, “how is he any different from those frozen cocksuckers stealing babies from their beds?”

She narrowed her eyes at him. “For a man so cynical of honor amongst people, Sandor Clegane, you are surprisingly resolute in your defense of Nissa Nissa. Tell me, have you ever been in love?”

Jon’s jaw dropped at her absurd question. Clegane stared her down.

“What in seven hells does that have to do with anything?” he growled.

“Is she a beauty?” Melisandre asked. “Is she a sweet, innocent thing? Is she another man’s wife? Is she alive?”

Jon stared. Clegane’s hand clenched and loosened almost rhythmically on the hilt of his sword.

“If the world was to fall into darkness, and every life upon it painfully and mercilessly extinguished, and it all came down onto you, Sandor Clegane, to find the strength to unsheathe your mighty sword and slide it at long last into your lady love to save the world and the race of men, tell me, would you do it?”

Clegane dropped his hand to his side. “Were I to come face to face with her again,” he said, “I would not put upon her anything she would not have, and the race of men could go fuck themselves, and the rest of the world too.” He turned and stalked away.

Melisandre watched him leave. Jon smirked and turned to follow.

“Don’t mope too long,” he said over his shoulder. “We leave for White Harbor in the morning.”

Two weeks later, Jon flagged the horses behind him to stop as he caught sight of Tormund Giantsbane galloping toward him at full speed. Three more followed close behind, though seven had left with the wildling that morning on their daily scout.

“We’re less than half a day outside the city,” Tormund told him, “but our ships will come up against a giant monster of a boat docked just past the inlet. It’s a fucking serpent, Jon, it’s three times bigger than any I’ve seen-”

“What color were the sails?” Jon asked.

“Black,” Tormund answered, “and a yellow creature coiled on it, like a cock with tentacles.”

“Like yours?” Jon returned. Tormund snorted. “It’s a ship from the Iron Islands, on the other side of the country. How many guards?” To think, an Iron ship just happened to cross his path. Jon wondered if it was one of the Iron Fleet.

“Thirty men left behind, by the looks of it,” Tormund said. “No match for us.”

“They must have some reason to enter the city,” he mused. “Why should they sail around Westeros to pillage White Harbor?” He turned to Clegane. “I want that ship,” he said.

The vessel was long, sleek and powerful. He ran his hand over the polished railing and looked up at black sails snapping in the wind. He remembered the confusing flash of images that washed over him when Maege Mormont turned up with Robb’s will. He had seen black sails and snow on fire, a sea of wights parting as he walked among them.

He turned toward the bow, but a runny glob of spittle landed on his boots and stopped him in his tracks.

Leathers snarled at the boy and yanked the rope tied around his wrists. The wildling grabbed a fistful of his hair and tugged the boy’s head back, whispering his blade across his neck. The boy’s throat gaped open in a bloody smile, and sticky spurts of crimson flooded his quaking hands. His cries sounded like squelching mud, and Jon raised his eyebrows at his master-of-arms.

He made to walk on without comment, but a high-pitched wheezing stopped him a second time. It was quiet, so quiet he would not have picked it up if the brisk ocean winds had not swept it past his ears. He narrowed his eyes and turned at the unguarded sound, so out of place on an Iron ship thick as a viper, potent with virility and contempt.

This boy was smaller than the first, his face thin and hollow, his chest expanding and contracting rapidly as he stared at his friend’s quaking body. Jon was surprised at the blatant exposure of weakness, then wondered why he should be. Innocence was not confined to warmth and sunshine, after all. It could exist in damp, dark places, though not often, and not for long.

Jon crouched on his haunches in front of the boy. His knees creaked in protest, but he folded his gloved hands between his legs, shifting his sword against his hip, and stared into the boy’s face.

“Look at me,” he ordered. His voice was quiet but brooked no argument. The boy shuddered with three broken gasps, eyes flicking at the wood now slick with blood under his knees, then lifted his chin to meet Jon’s gaze.

“Tell me why you are here,” he said simply. The boy swallowed and licked his chapped lips. His eyes darted to the other Ironborn sailors bound beside him, then to the larger group of piled corpses, even now being slung overboard under Tormund’s efficient scrutiny.

“Look at me,” he said again. The boy’s eyes flicked back, and after a moment, Jon thought he saw a change in his expression as his own gray gaze reflected back to him from the boy’s glassy black pupils.

“Are you one of them?” the boy asked, his voice hushed.

“One of whom?” Jon returned, curious.

“Are you a Faceless Man, like her? Why’ve you come after us? Marlow said she was a bad idea, he said she cursed the ship, but then we landed and they dragged her off into the city, and I thought we were safe.” The boy’s shoulders sagged as he looked back at his friend’s lifeless body.

Jon leaned back on his heels, considering. “Have you come from Braavos, then?” he asked. The boy nodded. “Your captain purchased the services of a Faceless Man,” he mused, “or a Faceless Woman, should I say?”

“A girl,” the boy spat, lip trembling. “A skinny little rat with eyes just like yours, and Gotho paid for her to kill the wolf brat before he could leave White Harbor, but instead she put her curse on us, and now we’ve been murdered, our ship taken by a lot of ragged, worthless swine-”

Jon took his small face in his hand, clenching his fingers into the hollows of the boy’s cheeks. The boy sputtered to a stop, gagging on his tongue when Jon tilted his head upward.

“I know you’re frightened, and that your entire life has just been turned upside down,” he said softly, “but don’t be a damned fool.” He dug his nails further into his jaw, forcing him to look down at the dead boy’s gaping throat. “You don’t need to go that way,” he murmured in his ear, “but you will, if I say so.” He dropped his hand, and the boy leaned back, gaze downcast. Jon stood up and ordered the dead boy cleared away. He strode on to the ship’s bow.

She stood so still he could have imagined her growing roots, taking her place as an ivory figurehead painted with the deepest vermilion, her eyes far off and distant, seeking lands beyond the scope of human gaze.

“What do you see?” he asked, looking up the coast where the city lay just around the next inlet. When she didn’t respond, he placed his hand on her arm. She came to life immediately, turning to fix her eyes on him. Jon’s breath caught in his throat. He had the distinct impression that her pupils had widened, sucking up the color of her irises into two deep black holes. Then she blinked, and the moment passed, her uncanny red gaze meeting his.

“My dead prince,” she said, her lips quirking upward.

Jon rolled his eyes. “What do you see?” he asked again. “Are the Ironborn pillaging the city?”

“Of course,” she returned, “but I didn’t see that; you did.”

“A boy down there said that they had picked up a Faceless Man, or a girl, actually, to ‘kill the wolf brat before he could leave White Harbor.’ Who do you suppose he was speaking of? Could the Ironborn have reason to believe that Bran was here, or Rickon?” His heart fluttered in his throat, and he forced it down savagely.

Melisandre turned back to the coast. Waves crashed against the hard black ship. A single snowflake landed on Jon’s nose, melted, and slid away. “Why do you seek answers from me when you are capable of discovering them yourself, Jon Snow?” she asked. “You look too closely at what is right in front of you; you do not look up to see the path ahead.”

Jon stepped back, irritated. He felt her assessment was distinctly unfair, and thought again of black sails.

“Come,” he said, tamping down his annoyance. “Ride into the city with me.” He turned and missed her look of surprise.

Their horses clattered down White Harbor’s cobbled streets, kicking up slush as townspeople stopped and stared. A blacksmith waved his arms, shaking a sooty rag in an attempt to entice potential customers. They turned a corner and started up a hill toward the whitewashed capitol, gleaming even through the swirling flakes spitting down on them from low gray clouds.

A guard of fifty men covered the gates below the Merman’s Keep. They wore heavy cloaks, identical blue mermen stitched upon their green tunics, identical tense grimaces set upon their stony faces. A young man astride a tall white horse cantered forward. He pushed back his hood to greet his strange guests, white flakes drifting in his dark reddish hair.

“Who approaches the bastion of the Manderlys of White Harbor without invitation?” he demanded.

Jon pressed his knees gently into his horse’s sides and leaned forward. Melisandre kept pace to his right, Clegane to his left.

“Greetings,” he said, cantering forward to treat with the commander of the guard. “I am Jon Snow of Winterfell, Lord Commander of the Wall. Is there a small party of Ironborn raiding your northern districts?”

The man’s mouth dropped open for an instant before he could recover himself. He ran a hand through red-brown locks and attempted an uncertain smirk. He was of an age with him, Jon saw. The man pulled his horse back one step and raised a hand in warning to his guard.

“Lord Snow, what is your purpose here?” he asked.

Jon set both hands upon the pommel of his saddle. “I’ve heard White Harbor is in possession of an excess of ships at the moment,” he said. “I rode south with the word of Lady Maege Mormont that I would be welcomed here. My men came across a vessel that is undoubtedly one of the Iron Fleet docked just five miles north.” The man’s mouth snapped shut at that. “I have taken command of the ship, and left half my forces behind to guard it. I have entered the city believing you might need assistance rounding up these raiders,” Jon flicked one hand open to the man in question. Their eyes met.

“Donnel, open the gates!” the man called. He wheeled his horse around. “Get the night’s shift up,” he commanded a man at the end of the line. The guard nodded, kicked his horse, and strode off down the hill past them. “Bryen!” he shouted, “Ready the guard!” He wheeled back around and cantered up to Jon, stretching out his hand. His eyes shone with glassy vigor. Red lines rose high his cheekbones. Jon gripped his fingers and shook.

“My name is William Snow,” he said. “I’m commander of the guard while Ser Marlon marches on Winterfell with your sister.”

The forward intensity of the day, of the past two weeks, shrieked to a halt, and a great gusting wind rose up in his ears.

He saw Clegane straighten on his stallion from the corner of his eye, while William Snow turned his horse once again and shouted to his men to lead the forces north.

A light pressure on his wrist drew his gaze to the right.

“Look up,” Melisandre told him softly. “See what lies ahead of you, beyond your own nose.” He looked at Clegane, whose gauntleted fist clenched tight to the reins bridling his black stallion. He turned back and saw his horsed men behind him, a queer mix of brute strength and sour vengeance. He looked again at William Snow galloping up the hill and leaned forward, tightening his knees.

Houses were burning two miles north of Merman’s Keep. Dirty smoke crept through the village and settled innocently on snow-covered roofs. Jon and his men thundered up the streets, spattering gray slush. A breeze from the harbor whistled up the alley and clouds of smoke parted and drifted away.

An alarm had been sounded; the raiders ran northward, William Snow’s guard at their heels. Jon motioned his men to spread out, and they gushed through White Harbor’s streets like a snarling flood welling through an irrigated maze.

The wildlings who remained on foot outside the city caught up with them at an open field just past the northern gate. The snow was packed down here, the imprints of thousands of boots tracking back and forth across the wide ring. The Ironborn made for the opposite line of trees bordering the dense northern woods, but sprang back when the thick white branches burst into flames. Wet bark sizzled and popped, and the raiders wheeled around against sudden, staggering billows of heat. Behind them, yellow and orange tongues licked high above their heads, flickering almost blue as the skies opened and released a torrent of frozen, stinging pellets.

Capitulation was furious, violent, and quick. The White Harbor guard and Jon’s men had the advantage of being horsed, though the hail confused and excited the animals. The guard led the capture, edging around the field’s perimeter, their horses dancing nervously past the burning woods. The cycling winds led the direction of their orbit around the trapped raiders, and the wildlings joined in enthusiastically. They surged through the gaps in the guard’s methodically tightening noose, hacking, slashing and trampling heedlessly. A sleek white mare near the center of the storm screamed and reared, terrified, and Jon watched a cold gray glint flash up to meet her. Her blood sprayed and spattered the hard faces of those encircling her as she turned and screamed and fell.

Two raiders slashed at Tormund’s legs, and he yelled, incensed when they connected in livid red ribbons against his stallion’s flank. He pummeled his blade with both hands down upon one of the raider’s thick shoulders, and yanked it up again, dripping with blood and slimy bits of torn sinew. He turned and hacked at the other, while the White Harbor guard circled closer. One of the guard, a thick, ugly man with cold, close-set eyes, charged forward, impatient with remaining outside the carnage. The man scanned the crowd of trapped, snarling Ironborn, eyes lighting upon a smaller raider, likely a boy in oversized mail, and he smiled, a wet, horrid leer. Jon turned away in disgust.

Clegane sat next to him on the ring’s southern precipice. He watched the combat calmly, shielding his face from the slowing sleet with thick, gloved fingers. Jon narrowed his eyes, but Clegane did not appear either nervous or eager to join the bloodshed. Jon turned back and examined the opposite woods, flames still churning past twice the height of their heads. Thick black clouds, heavy with rising steam, curled through narrow gaps between the close trees, only to break apart and dissipate when they rolled into the open field, exposed to the falling sleet. The fire licked through icy branches, and melted dense feet of snow on the ground into puddles that hissed and evaporated, converging with the dirty, low-hanging smoke.

Melisandre’s eyes were dark, and her bright red jewel pulsed like a beating heart, but otherwise she appeared unaffected. Jon leaned over and could feel the warmth rising from her pale, dry skin.

“I saw snow on fire when Maege Mormont brought me Robb’s will,” he told her, raising his voice against the winds and violence around them.

She turned to look at him, and her intense, fervent beauty caught him cruelly unawares. The hail turned abruptly to snow and fell innocently in her hair. The gnashing surrender of the Ironborn raiders buzzed loudly as the swirling winds settled and died. Jon tore his eyes away from her mouth and cleared his throat.

“That man said my sister Sansa was marching on Winterfell,” he continued. Clegane turned his head, then snapped back to attention. “She must cross paths with King Stannis. Perhaps, even now, they have joined forces and overpowered Roose Bolton. But I didn’t see Winterfell,” he said, and he knew she understood. “I saw snow on fire, and black sails-”

“And an army of the dead,” she finished for him. She looked back at the burning trees, northward, and if Jon didn’t know better, he would have thought she shivered.

“It is against nature, for fire to burn on snow and water,” he said. “You turn the very bonds of existence inside out.”

“The Lord of Light works through me; it is he who has the power-”

Jon shook his head. “The Lord of Light might have lit the wick, but _you’re_ the one who keeps the fire burning. He is a veil, a cloak, a screen that hides your strength. With him, you are potent and determined; without him, you are as boundless as the horizon at sunrise.”

She looked up at him; her lips parted, her glassy eyes reflecting silvery rays sneaking through rising gray clouds. Her white throat convulsed once as she swallowed. “I would have you come with me,” he told her, “but I would not- could not- keep you from your King.” He held her eyes a moment longer, then turned to Clegane.

“Round them up,” he ordered. Clegane opened his mouth to speak, but Jon kicked his horse and rode around the perimeter, signaling at Ser William Snow. The man extricated himself from the ring and cantered across the field to him, while Clegane commanded the wildlings to pull back. Less than one hundred raiders still stood, and they dropped their weapons when the order came. Jon’s father had told him that the Ironborn were too proud and too brutal to allow themselves to be taken alive. In some, it appeared, the will to live was stronger than pride, than honor.

“Lord Snow,” Ser William huffed, his color high, his hair wet and windblown, “White Harbor owes you a debt-”

“Lady Maege Mormont told me that Wyman Manderly had entertained some guests before he left for Winterfell,” Jon interrupted him. “Tell me, are there any Freys left in the city?”

William Snow looked at him oddly. “Your sister asked me the very same question when she was here. I told her there were, and she ordered the guard to confine them at Merman’s Keep.”

Jon remembered Sansa holding up her skirts, stepping daintily over a dirty stream sluicing its way through melting snow in one of Winterfell’s courtyards. She flinched when the boys pelted each other with muddy handfuls of slush. “Where are they now?” he asked.

“Still locked up in the Keep,” he shrugged. “They’re a bloody pain in the ass, small wonder Lady Stark had no use for them.”

“How many?” Jon watched as Clegane and the wildlings efficiently piled corpses in a heap at the western edge of the field. Clegane kept to the south, opposite the blazing woods. Jon could see the wary misery in his gait.

“Near on a hundred,” Ser William answered. “Ungrateful little pricks, too. I’d be well rid of them, but she said to hold them-”

“Bring them out,” Jon interrupted again. “I’ll take them off your hands.”

Clegane cantered up to him when Ser Snow returned with fifty of his men dragging a cluster of cursing, spitting Freys. Melisandre stood at the pile of burning corpses, looking up at the column of black smoke spiraling high into the sky. Jon watched the ugly man with the wet smile step aside as the White Harbor guard ushered their old prisoners in with the new, his strange pale eyes glittering. He felt an itch, a prickle, a magnetic pull that drew his gaze back to the burning pier. Melisandre stood, staring at the man.

“He has seen your sister,” Clegane rasped, lifting his chin at William Snow. Jon nodded at the unasked question. “She is gone back to Winterfell,” he continued. Jon nodded again. “The guard says she sailed up with six thousand men, and left with near eight on their journey west. A few hundred returned a week later, picked up a few herds of sheep and cattle, hauled up ten thousand pounds of glass and more of plant seeds and took off again.”

“She means to rebuild the glass gardens,” Jon mused and felt oddly gratified.

“You should join your strength to hers,” Clegane said. “Help her restore your home.”

“We all have our parts to play. I would not take hers from her,” Jon said regretfully, “or yours.” He turned back to the hostages shivering in the snow. He cantered forward and the wildlings and White Harbor guard parted to let him through.

“What a queer mix of people and purposes are here,” he said, and their faces looked up at him, angry, hard, and tired. “My father told me there was no higher purpose than family and honor. He told me the gods would reward me for sacrifices made for the good of my people. He said the gods would take me into their keeping when I was done with this world, so long as I lived my life with honor.”

The White Harbor men shifted uneasily. The wildlings muttered to each other. The prisoners looked up at him, waiting.

“But there are as many different kinds of honor as there are families,” Jon continued. “There are as many different sacrifices to be made as there are men to make them. You are coming with me,” he told them. “I don’t know if the gods are real, or if they will take you to heaven for your sacrifice. But know this: if they _are_ real, they have put you in my path because they know where I am going.”

“Where’s that?” a voice demanded. It was the man with pale eyes and blotchy pink skin, his mouth a wide wet gap. Jon felt a warm breath against his neck and knew she stood behind him. He let the heat trickle down his sternum, coalescing into a simmering pool in his chest. A hair’s breadth of tension went out of his shoulders.

“We’re going to hell,” he said, smiling to himself.

“Jon,” he heard her say before a fist connected brutally with his jaw, five sharp pricks clawing at his scalp.

“You fucking bastard,” the ugly man snarled, close enough Jon could see the rotting sores on his tongue. Jon leaned away from his putrid breath. The man drew his hand back. He’d retrieved a short knife as cruel and ugly as he was. Jon watched it arc back, clenched in the man’s dirty, stubby fingers.

And then it was gone, and the man was clawing at Clegane’s gauntleted wrist tucked in a chokehold against his throat. Clegane yanked greasy black hair from its curtain around the man’s face, and Jon saw a pink gleam from the man’s ear. He looked closer; it took the shape of a teardrop.

“Ramsay Snow,” Jon said, and shook his head. “There are more bastards in this field than in the dead army!”

“I’ll kill you,” he choked, and Clegane tightened his hold.

“Where have you come from?” Clegane demanded. The man worked his jaw, tongue wagging, and Clegane released his grip slightly.

“Winterfell,” he gasped. “I burned it from the inside, after I fucked your whore sister-”

It happened so quickly, Jon could have blinked and he would have missed it. The cold swish as a blade rasped free from its hilt, the perfectly measured step backward, the song of steel whistling above the popping flames, and then Ramsay Snow’s body stood still as a severed marionette before toppling in the wet snow after his head.

“I can’t-” Clegane grunted, breathing quickly, looking down at the dark blood dripping in thick red drops as impeccably round as Ramsay Snow’s sigil. “I can’t go with you, Jon.” He looked up, and Jon saw true remorse in his eyes.

“I know,” Jon said. “Tell Sansa- tell Sansa...” He stopped and thought.

What was there to say?

He stooped and grasped a handful of wet, coarse hair from the slush. Ramsay Snow’s dripping head dangled from his fingers.

“Give her this for me.”


	16. Arya III

One day when Arya was six or seven years old, she upended a full jug of lemon juice over a village girl’s head.

Her brother Bran had only just begun speaking in complete sentences, and Rickon was barely an idea, not a whole person. Robb and Jon played with her once in a while, outside in an open courtyard where her mother could keep watch for unruly behavior from her window seat in the third-floor library. But fourteen-year-old boys don’t take much interest in the daily thoughts and activities of a seven-year-old girl. They were quite content to obliviously leave Arya in the clutches of five maidens of varying birth, between the ages of eight and thirteen, all of whom were growing up in Winterfell, and all of whom considered themselves models of grace and sophistication.

Her sister Sansa, of course, who would have been nine at the time, along with Sansa’s best friend Jeyne Poole, who could spin a yarn that would have the whole group riveted, waiting for the punch line that always made Arya laugh, so long as she wasn’t the featured character. Corley, who at thirteen was the oldest; Wendela, who had a gap between her front teeth and deep blue eyes that Arya envied; and Helaena, who was a year older than Arya. Helaena forsook the old gods in favor of Arya’s sister Sansa, who was beautiful and elegant and so _tall_. Helaena did not understand why Arya couldn’t realize she was unduly blessed to be related to such a creature.

“What lovely curls you’ve pressed in your hair!” she would exclaim. “Oh Sansa, won’t you pin up my hair like yours?” Or, “My stitches will never be so perfect, Lady Sansa,” she would shake her head in glum resignation, “but I shall watch your hand closely so they never become as clumsy as Arya’s!”

Arya tried to ignore these comments as best she could, and most days she did not much mind when people complained that her stitches were ugly, or her shoes were caked with mud, or her torn dress was unbecoming of a young lady, or her hair was a frightful mess, because usually all those things were true, and more often than not, they were all true at the same time. She preferred climbing trees and riding horses to taking tea indoors, but sometimes it was hard to look at the same cluster of faces every day and never see a kindred reflection.

“Let’s play Queen’s Castle!” Halaena exclaimed that day, fluttering her hands together excitedly. A fierce hail was clattering against the roof and bouncing off the windows, and the sky was a dangerous dark gray. Arya had tried to find refuge in the kitchens, but she had been bent on her hands and knees, her cheek pressed flat to the dusty floor, her arm stretched under the cupboard, fingers scrabbling to catch a scrawny little mouse she had just seen skitter away, when a serving boy stepped backward and toppled over her. It wouldn’t have been so bad, Arya thought, except that the raw slab of beef that he had been carrying, freshly seasoned and ready to be roasted, went flying and smacked the cook right in the chest, spattering her dress with pink juices, before plopping despondently to the floor.

So now she was trapped in Septa Mordane’s schoolroom with the other girls, pretending to practice her needlework, drinking tea and lemon juice and playing ‘Queen’s Castle’, which only ever featured one queen.

“Sansa, you’ll be Good Queen Alysanne, of course,” Helaena declared. Sansa smiled demurely and refilled her cup with lemon juice.

“Let me be Rhaena this time,” Jeyne demanded. “I can play it much better than you, Halaena, because I am three years older and I have more experience with the world. I know what it is like to struggle against the unjust for the greater good!”

Helaena looked unconvinced, while Corley reminded Jeyne that she was the oldest, so it was only right that she play Rhaena.

“But Corley,” Jeyne exclaimed, “Rhaena needs to ride her dragon Dreamfyre to bring the Valyrian sword to her sister, and I don’t see how any of us could possibly carry you!” Corley turned beat red and sat back in her chair, fiddling with her embroidered handkerchief.

“Corley can be Alyssa Velaryon,” Sansa chipped in. “Alysanne’s mother. She was kind and gentle, and very beautiful, I’m sure. Alyssa Velaryon lived a long life and gave birth to, oh, ten children or more! _And_ she was the third Queen Consort,” Sansa added, almost as an afterthought. Arya didn’t have to ask to know that they would not be playing Queen Alyssa’s Castle.

“Fine,” Helaena said, “then I’ll be Princess Daella, and Wendela, you can be Princess Saera.” Wendela started and shook her head, a slight blush rising on her cheeks.

“I don’t think-” she said, lowering her voice, “I don’t think it’s _proper_ for any of us to play Princess Saera.”

“By the seven, what are you talking about?” Helaena exclaimed imperiously, even though her father worshipped the old gods so she had never set foot in a sept. Wendela leaned forward and whispered conspiratorially.

“Don’t you know what Princess Saera did?” she asked, and looked around the table at them, her eyes widened with affected incredulity. “ _None_ of you?” she shook her head and looked at Corley significantly. “I suppose _you_ know,” Wendela said, “the others are too young to hear such things.” Corley nodded knowingly, though Arya was sure she was just as much in the dark as the rest of them.

“Princess Saera joined the faith when she was very young,” Sansa said, as though that was the end of it.

“But she didn’t like it,” Wendela said, “no wonder, can you imagine, being surrounded by a hundred Septa Mordanes all the time?” She giggled. “I think I’d go mad.” Sansa fidgeted uncomfortably, but Wendela didn’t notice. “Princess Saera ran away and jumped a ship across the Narrow Sea to the free cities, where she settled down and opened a-” she lowered her voice to a stage whisper “- _a_ _house of ill repute_.”

Arya wondered what a house of ill repute was. Corley’s mouth dropped open, and Sansa looked completely mortified, but Helaena seemed just as stumped as she was.

“What’s a-” Helaena started, but Sansa jumped in.

“That’s enough, Wendela,” she said sharply. The other girl’s eyes flashed with surprise. “Fine,” Sansa continued, smoothing her napkin on her lap, “you don’t have to be Princess Saera. You can be- you can be Maechelle.”

“Who’s that?” Helaena asked, intrigued.

“My handmaiden,” Sansa said haughtily, and Wendela’s smile slid off her face. Sansa leaned back in her chair, raising her chin, slipping into the character of the Queen.

“Wait!” Jeyne said, and Sansa sighed exasperatedly, slapping her hands back down on the armrests. “What about Arya?”

Five heads swiveled and turned to look at her as if they had only just remembered she was there, which was indeed the case.

“Oh, Arya,” Sansa said, surprised.

“I don’t want to play,” Arya piped up quickly. Helaena turned back, relieved, but Sansa shook her head.

“Nonsense,” she said, “you must! But who should you be...” she tapped her fingers on the table and mused.

“I’ll be King Jaehaerys,” Arya suggested. The other girls looked at her as though she sported a tentacle from her forehead.

“Don’t start being ridiculous, now!” Sansa groaned. “You can’t play a boy. Arya, you should be Rhaena, because you’re my sister, and Jeyne can play Princess-”

“Why doesn’t Arya just be Silverwing again?” Jeyne interrupted. “She liked that well enough last time.”

“Oh no,” Helaena shook her head disdainfully, “it was a complete disaster! You remember: she jumped off that bench so she could ‘take flight’ and crashed into the table! She spilled the juice and made a complete mess of everything!”

“Oh right,” Jeyne giggled. “Well, maybe she should just play Queen Alysanne’s horse, then.” Jeyne scrunched up her nose and whinnied. The other girls laughed. Arya glared.

“I want to be Queen,” she demanded. “I want to be Queen Nymeria.”

“Arya-” Sansa began, but Helaena turned on Arya, eyes flashing.

“Sansa is Queen,” she said. “There can’t be two queens, and anyway, we chose Sansa.”

“You always play Queen Alysanne’s Castle!” Arya protested. “There are other queens besides her-”

“But Good Queen Alysanne was beautiful, and gentle, and loved by all!” Sansa said, shocked.

“She’s _boring_ ,” Arya argued. “But we could pretend we were trapped in the jungles of Abulu, building up the Rhoynar fleet, and I’ll be Nymeria and the rest of you can be my warrior-women-”

“You must be joking,” Helaena said. “I am not playing a dirty savage to your savage queen!”

Arya was outraged. “Queen Nymeria was not a savage!” she shrieked.  “She saved her people when the dragons came! She commanded an army and conquered Dorne! She was a warrior; she wasn’t afraid to fight for her people-”

“ _Girls don’t fight_ ,” Helaena snarled. “You weren’t born a boy, no matter how much you wish it; you won’t be a warrior and you won’t fight in battle, and the rest of us are sick of your stupid savage warrior-queen nonsense!”

It was at that point that Arya grabbed the jug of sticky sweet lemon juice and poured it on her perfectly curled and pinned head.

The other girls jumped up, screeching. Wendela vanished, her feet slipping on the floor as she turned the corner to the hallway in her haste to be the first to snitch on Arya. And Arya was punished, oh yes. She was sentenced to three days in her rooms with no games or toys, only her needlework and Septa Mordane’s tedious texts on repenting for evil transgressions, and she was forbidden to speak to anyone, even her brothers. But years later, Arya didn’t remember those long boring days. She remembered Helaena’s shocked expression, her mouth gaping in a perfect round ‘o’, her shoulders hunched up to her ears while sticky yellow drops dripped down the neck of her dress. Vengeance had been sweet that day, lemony sweet.

On the third day of her incarceration, her mother paid Arya a visit. She sat on the bed, patted the spot next to her, brushed out the tangles in Arya’s unruly hair, and told her a story. The story went like this:

A big, shaggy black bear was prowling around the woods one day. He had just awoken from a long slumber and was very hungry, but the forest was nearly empty of deer and other animals for him to eat. Just as the sun started to set and the woods began to grow dark, he came upon a log with the sweetest smell he had ever encountered. He put his nose to the log to investigate, and the log hummed back at him. It was full of a nest of honeybees!

The bear licked his chops at the thought of all that sweet hidden honey. He placed his paw carefully on the log and was just about to gently roll it over to coax out some of the sweet syrup without upsetting the swarm, when one little bee buzzed out and noticed the bear standing there. The little bee knew the bear would eat all of his swarm’s precious honey, so he flew up and stung him sharply on the nose.

The bear was enraged. He had felt pain before, but never had he received it by the will of such a small, insignificant little creature! The bear knocked the log over and tried to smash it with his claws, determined now to kill all the loathsome little bees. But by knocking the log over, he let the entire swarm know that he was there, and they all flew out of the nest together and began to sting him over and over, from nose to knees and head to heel.

He roared in agony. One little sting had pricked him into a rage, but now he had been stung a hundred times, a thousand times! The swarm engulfed him, and he knew a moment of true misery and terror. Oh, why had he swiped at the log in his anger? He could have endured one little sting and gone back to quietly sneaking drops of honey while the hive buzzed on, unawares.

The bear ran for an icy mountain lake and jumped in the freezing water, even though winter had just begun to thaw. In this way, he was able to escape the bees and survive, though he felt tremendous pain and did not taste even a lick of honey that day.

“Do you understand, Arya?” her mother asked kindly. Arya looked at her toes and shrugged. “The bear let himself get so angry after just one little sting, that he completely forgot that he needed to find something to eat, and he even forgot about his own safety. It would have been better for him to endure the first sting quietly than to lose his temper and upset the entire swarm.”

“Perhaps he did, and the little bees kept flying out of the log one by one?” Arya countered. “How is a bear supposed to let himself be stung stung over and over without fighting back?”

“Arya,” her mother sighed, “I don’t want to see you lose yourself to your own anger. You are so spirited and lively, daughter; it is your nature to fight when you perceive injustice. I just don’t want to see you create more trouble for yourself. Trouble will find you on its own, Arya.”

But Arya was contemplating another turn the story might have taken, so only heard half of what her mother had said.

“I know what the bear should have done!” she exclaimed. “He should have soothed his temper after the first sting and gone about his revenge more intelligently! He could have carried the log to the mountain lake,” she mused, “so long as he was careful. He could have drowned all the bees at once-”

“You have not listened to a word I’ve said!” her mother snapped, standing up from the bed. “You are not a bear; you are not a bee. You are a little girl, Arya, and from now on, you will control your temper when something or some _one_ makes you angry! I’ll not hear any more tales of lemon juice, or books being thrown, or gods forbid, girls shoved into the pond again!” She placed her hands on her hips and glowered. “Do you understand me, Arya?”

Arya clenched her hands in fists to keep herself from protesting. She nodded and stared at the floor.

“Good,” her mother huffed in a sigh and swept toward the door. She turned back at the precipice, as though she had something more to say, but she only shook her head and stepped into the hallway, snapping the door closed behind her.

Arya didn’t understand. Her mother had told her the story of the bear and the bees, hoping she would take some lesson from it, and Arya had learned something, but apparently it wasn’t the right thing to have learned. Or perhaps, Arya mused, her mother just couldn’t see it. Perhaps it was a lesson her mother wasn’t meant to learn.

 _Sometimes_ , Arya thought, _you just have to drown the bees._

The woman was crouched in the snow twenty yards outside the tower again. She scraped a pile of snow aside, retrieved a blunted ax from her belt and smashed the handle into the ground. After a few moments of work, she leaned back on her heels, satisfied, and tucked the ax back into place at her waist. She moved carefully to her knees and stared down at the spot she had revealed. Next, she pulled off one glove, finger by finger, and pocketed it, then rolled up her sleeve. She hovered, poised, ready to strike, her eyes focused on a single point below her. Mist billowed and evaporated from her mouth. When she finally moved, it was a quick snap, her arm darting down and flashing back up. She cursed quietly, shaking her wrist, spattering the snow with water that was already beginning to freeze over. She stilled again, looking down, steam rising steadily now from her dripping arm.

The wolf prowled at the edge of the forest, bored but compelled to keep watch. A nearby rustling among some deadened overgrowth pricked his ears, but the other one kept a firm grip on his attention, coaxing his eyes back to the woman.

She knelt at the northern edge of a long depression in the snow. The tower stood like a shabby, run-down sentinel to the south. Men teemed about the tower like flies droning angrily against a window. They paced and stomped, they stood and looked at the gray skies, they went back inside to make room for others coming out. They waved their arms and snarled at each other, they kicked at the snow, they half-heartedly swung their blades together. She was one of a handful of women the wolf had seen, though she dressed like a man in dark trousers, heavy boots and a close-fitting leather jerkin. She kept apart from the others, skirting around the men when she could, but holding her head high when they stared as she passed. She was active, skulking the woods with her bow to scavenge what little life remained there, whittling her arrows into sharp razor points, walking around and around the long open fields bordering the tower to the north and south. Now she was ice fishing, the wolf realized as he prowled closer and sniffed at the scummy traces of inland water threading the cold air. He slunk backward, a low growl rumbling in his chest. Here was danger, he knew; here was the loud crack of icy, eternal surrender. The wolf wondered if the woman knew what stark peril threatened just below her feet.

He wondered if she knew what was coming, what was marching and stumbling her way even now from the east.

He crept closer, wanting a better view of the woman’s face. He couldn’t see her eyes from where he stood; she still looked down at the hole she had punched in the ice. It was difficult to make out distinctions so far away, but even he could tell that her nose was too big to nicely balance with the features of her long, thin face. Something inside the wolf decided that he liked her mismatched nose, which was strange, because normally he didn’t care at all for faces. They were too bony and sinewy; nothing to them. The rump, though; oh yes, the rump was where the richness was: strands of juicy, fatty tissue, _mmm_. The wolf licked his chops at the thought, then eyed the woman’s posterior in contemplation. Flat and lean, he noted in disgust.

She jumped up suddenly with an air of achievement, a wriggling fish flopping in her hands. She drew out a short knife, and the wolf stepped closer, intrigued.

A branch broke beneath his paw, and the slight crack reverberated along the snow-covered ice in the too-quiet air. The woman gasped and spun, staring at the flat, frozen lake bed stretching beyond her feet, but the surface held; no fissures or fractures crawled up to meet her. She lifted her gaze warily and caught sight of the wolf staring back at her from the eastern bank.

She froze, and he froze too, and their eyes met and held for one brief second of mutual awareness.  They were cognate in that moment; they were parallel, universal, kindred.

Then she took a step backward, sliding her foot carefully on the slippery ice, and the wolf turned and ran, icy fingers rippling his fur, his paws pounding against the hard, frozen ground as he darted through the woods, running back the way he had come, back to the pack, to the queen, to the girl.

Nymeria’s cousins were growing angry. The forest was bare of fresh prey, and they itched to move faster, to run and run and not stop until they were somewhere with more succulent life to hunt, somewhere that was warmer and not so dead. But she snarled and snapped impatiently when they whined, so they dropped back and circled once more around the man herd she compelled them to stalk. They didn’t mind the meat from these two-legged creatures, though it was stringy, tough and not their favorite. It would feel as good going down as a flock of baby lambs at this point, their bellies were so cold and empty. But Nymeria snapped at them when they prowled too close, and she had already broken the necks of two brothers who had dragged away a smaller one from the herd, gobbling down his juicy, steaming innards before any of the others even caught a whiff of the bloody carnage. Her message was clear: they were to keep pace with the herd of men and to stay out of sight, and they were not to touch them, just as they weren’t to touch the girl. Nymeria was queen; she was alpha and she was death, so the wolves kept their distance and restrained from slaughtering these shivering, worn-out bipeds. For now.

He prowled just past the light flickering pathetically from a handful of torches propped up on one side of the herd’s camp. He paced right, left, right, left again to keep warm, his breath turning to crystals on his nose. He came upon a cousin doing the same twenty yards down. They stopped, looked at each other, growled, and turned back to their pacing.

“Did you hear something?”

“What?”

“I don’t know, like a- like something moving over there.”

“Where?”

“Over _there_ , just past the- just past that cluster of trees...”

Silence, then an impatient huff, boots crunching on the hard-packed snow, and one of the flickering yellow lights moved closer, bobbing up and down. A man’s face came into view.  His hair was lank and tangled, a dark, dirty blond shot through with gray. Shadows sagged below his eyes, greenish in the strange yellow light. He lifted the burning stick higher and squinted around the dark forest, a sour expression on his face. The wolf and his brother were still, watching, unseen.

“Nothing,” the man grunted and spat irritably in the snow. He turned and stomped back to camp. The wolf began pacing again.

It was quiet but for men shifting in their sleep, the sputtering of torches blowing out and being lit again. This was cold and tedious and completely unsatisfying, and sometime soon he was going to lose it, he would jump on these meager, useless two-legged creatures and take them unawares-

“How do the wolves stand it?” He paused, his ears pricking up.

A snort, a shuffle, another glob of spittle landing in the snow. “Must be part-beast themselves, the fiends.”

“Idiots, more like,” the other said, a hint of snobbishness coloring his tone, so out of place in the middle of a deep, dark forest. “I would never choose to live someplace like this, never.”

“Yeah, well,” his partner shifted, lifting his feet, “she can have it, the bitch, that’s what I said, and that’s what I’ll tell the miserable old coot when we get back.”

A pause, more shifting, the rustle of gloves rubbing together. Then-

“It won’t be the end,” his voice was quiet, tired, inevitable. “They won’t forget, not after the Young Wolf-”

“Shut it, Raymond,” the other man snarled. “The bitch has her castle now, she won’t bother with us. We’re going south, where there’s still food to hunt and grain to store up, where it’s not so fucking cold. We’re going home, and they’re not going to stop us.”

 _Not likely_ , Arya thought, and pulled back to where she lay with three warm bodies curled in a pile of brush underneath a wide, spindly pine tree.

She had happened upon the wolves five days outside White Harbor. Her delusions of the waif’s past life had stopped and been replaced by wolf dreams again. Dreaming, she was constantly dreaming, even when she was awake, she wasn’t always in her own body. It was difficult to remember if Arya was real or if she was another dream, too.

When Nymeria found her, Arya was sleeping in an abandoned hunting cabin, shaking with hunger and howling with the pack outside. She was dirty, exhausted, bruised, starved and frozen.

They found the Freys much the same as Nymeria had found Arya.

It was providence, Arya thought. It was fate. It was the will of the God of Many Faces. The old gods had made it so. The Stranger, perhaps, set her feet upon this road. Or maybe it was just a combination of improbable coincidences. Maybe it was a cosmic joke.

Maybe, but it wouldn’t be the Freys laughing at the punch line.

Nymeria roused the pack early the next morning. She prowled and snapped, and the wolves uncurled from their slumber, shaking off the remnants of hunting dreams and snow that had fallen in the night. They tussled and nipped at each other’s heels, bumped noses together and growled playfully before darting off to run through the woods with the rest of the pack. Arya watched and ignored the great empty well of loneliness inside of her.

The direwolf approached and stopped, waiting. Arya reached out a hand to touch her face, but Nymeria shook her off impatiently. The wolf turned, showing Arya her back, and looked into the still, white woods where the rest of the pack had run. It had been the same since Nymeria had first found her. Arya grasped a handful of fur around her neck, hitched a leg up and slid onto her back, but didn’t try to stroke her again. Arya understood.

They caught up to the pack a hundred yards past the Freys’ camp. The wolves circled each other, slinking around narrow gaps between the trees, playing quietly as they waited for Nymeria. She entered the glen and loped down the middle of the group, snapping at her cousins where they parted to let her through. Faster and faster she ran, and Arya bent low to avoid the cruel slap of frozen branches. The wolves growled, surprised, but quickly they nipped at each other and raced through the woods after her, exhilarated, panting, relieved to leave the dull, laggard man herd behind.

The reached the crofter’s tower with its frozen mountain lakes little more than an hour later. The wolves sniffed around curiously, keeping to the trees. The woman was fishing again, in a far corner of the southern lake, and this time a stooped old man huddled next to her.

They spoke quietly together as the woman knelt in the snow, gutted fish and added their measly corpses to her pile. The old man kept his hands tucked inside his cloak and shifted awkwardly from foot to foot as he stood next to her. He didn’t offer to help, and she didn’t ask him to. Every now and again, one or the other would glance back at the tower, where men paced testily, keeping a wary eye on the odd pair as they fished across the wide open field.

Arya slipped into the same wolf skin as the day before. He growled at her irritably, but got to his feet and trotted to the edge of the woods. He stood patiently at the crest of the trees, peering at the woman. He almost blended in, his gray fur the same hue as the hemlocks stretching tall and proud on either side.

The woman looked up as though she felt the weight of his stare. Her gaze found him unerringly. She looked at him for only a moment before turning her head and murmuring to the old man. He took a step back, tilted his head in question. She shrugged, and he shivered, hugging himself, then stepped away from her and picked his way back to the tower with slow, awkward feet. The woman watched him go and narrowed her eyes when the others skirted away from him as he passed inside. She scooped her slimy pile of bloody fish into a sling around her shoulder, repositioned her bow against her neck, then slipped away into the woods.

The wolf turned and stalked between the trees, deeper into the forest. The woman followed. The wolf broke into a moderate trot; the woman paused, cursed to herself, and then ran after him, her boots crunching along carefully on the knotty forest floor.

She looked up from her feet when the ground smoothed of snarling roots and found before her a small clearing in the woods where a hundred wolves or more were snapping at each other and prowling all around, and in the middle of them all stood Arya.

“Fucking hell,” the woman muttered to herself, eyes darting about the glen. The wolf that had led her through the woods turned and sniffed eagerly at her bag of fish guts. The woman tensed and quickly drew her bow off her arm, reaching over her shoulder to her quiver of needle-sharp arrows.

“Don’t,” Arya said and stepped forward. The woman froze, eyeing her warily.

“Who are you?” the woman asked, fingers clenching around the smooth, arched wood of her weapon. It was dark and rich, and Arya thought it was beautiful.

“Who are you with?” Arya returned. “Who are those men guarding that ramshackle tower, and why?”

The woman swallowed, her eyes darting from wolf to wolf, looking for an opening in the pack, a route from which to escape. The first wolf growled and lowered his body menacingly to the ground, his eyes on her bag. She raised her bow again, and Arya saw her fingers itching for an arrow.

“Just give it to them,” Arya said impatiently. “Here,” she held out her hand, “give it to me.”

It was a wretch, apparently, giving up the goods she had earned all afternoon, but the woman lowered her bow and reluctantly handed the bag over. Arya flung it behind her, and the wolves pounced, snarling, while she turned her attention back to the woman.

“Well?” she asked.

“I was captured at Deepwood Motte by forces led by Stannis Baratheon,” she said sourly. “ _King_ Stannis,” as an afterthought.

“Stannis,” Arya mused. “So those are Stannis’ men?” she asked. The woman nodded, her jaw clenched.  “And Stannis is here too, at the tower?” The woman nodded again. “What is he doing here in the middle of nothing?” she asked.

The woman shrugged. “Waiting to march on Winterfell,” she said. “We were trapped by the snows, so we made camp, but then the men started dying, and more turned out to be traitors.  Now it’s been months and there’s no way we can take Winterfell with our men as measly as they are, no way we can make it back to Deepwood Motte with more of us alive than not.”

“I see,” Arya said. The woman crossed her arms and glared, apparently unwilling to say more without prodding.

“Winterfell has already been won,” she announced, quickly brushing aside her own gaping fears and longing. The woman blinked, surprised, unfolded her arms. “A group of men that had been stationed there under Roose Bolton ran away, like slippery little rats. They are marching this way, even now. They should be here by nightfall.”

“Who are they?” the woman asked, a harsh glimmer in her eye.

“I don’t keep company with cowards,” Arya said, “but I believe that most of them are Freys.”

The woman’s lips quirked in a brief almost-smile, but then her eyes looked past Arya, and all trace of humor slid off her slack-jawed face.

“ _What is dead may never die_ ,” she muttered to herself, raising her bow defensively in front of her once more. Arya turned.

The direwolf stalked through the clearing, her brothers and sisters parting before her and snapping at her heels. Her silver fur gleamed dully in the misty glen, her eyes a molten, glowing gold. She stalked silently, her head rising twice the height of her tallest brothers.

The first time Arya had seen her again, she had known a moment of pure terror. There were times, like now, when Arya knew that she lived not by the will of some far-off vengeful god, but by Nymeria’s will, and Nymeria’s will alone.

The wolf prowled up to where Arya stood facing the woman. She sniffed the ground, glanced up at the woman without much interest, and lay down imperiously at Arya’s feet.

The woman made a valiant effort to still her shaking, but Arya saw her fingers trembling about her wooden bow.

“That’s a direwolf,” she said faintly, then cleared her throat, her eyes flicking up at Arya. Her gaze caught and held Arya’s eyes, then roamed almost hungrily about her features. “Who are you?” the woman asked again.

Arya realized suddenly that it had been ages, years, since another person had looked upon her true, uncovered face. She felt more vulnerable at that moment than she had any right to, with a hundred wolves at her back and the queen lying at her feet.

She nodded at the woman’s bow. “Give that to me,” she demanded.

The woman narrowed her eyes. “Why?”

Arya shrugged. “Because I want it,” she said and held out her hand.

The woman turned the bow over in her grip then held it out. Arya’s fingers examined the curves and grooves, the friendly little notch where one would lay down their arrow. It was like meeting an old friend again.

“And the quiver,” she ordered.

The woman slung it carefully off her back, bounced it once to jostle all the arrows into place, and handed it over. Arya picked through the arrows carefully. This was good work, she admitted to herself. The bodies were longer than she was accustomed to, but they were pliant and sturdy. The points were perfectly sharp, so sharp she could even use one as a hand weapon if she needed to. She pictured it clenched in her fingers, jammed into the soft spot just below an enemy’s throat. Arya chose an arrow at random and deftly pulled it out, swinging the quiver across her shoulders.

“I used to be pretty good at this,” she commented, notching the arrow and pointing just right of the woman’s face. “Well, I wasn’t half bad.” She quickly pulled the bow back across her body and let the arrow fly with a soft twang. It whistled true and lodged itself firmly in a wide birch tree just behind the woman’s shoulder.

To her credit, she hadn’t so much as flinched, though she looked less than pleased.

“What are you going to do?” she asked, a hint of impatience in her voice.

“Me?” Arya shrugged. “I just told you what I know. By nightfall, there will be two thousand Freys on your doorstep.” She slung the bow across her back, testing its fit. Just a little too big. “They won’t stop to coordinate or plan. They’re too cold, and stupid. They’ll march out in front of the tower and demand it be given over to them.” She slid the bow off, flipped it around, and tried slinging it across her shoulders the other direction. Still too big. “They won’t even wait for the sun to rise, for day to light the ground beneath their feet.” She shrugged. “Like I said, they’re not very smart.”

The woman nodded slowly, still searching her face. “You’re a Stark, aren’t you?” she asked. Arya froze. “That’s a direwolf at your feet,” she said softly. “And you look like a Northern girl,” she continued, then snorted, glancing around the glen. “You look like a Northern legend. Are you a cousin, then, or an offshoot from some bastard line?” Arya couldn’t help it; her face twisted briefly in scorn. The woman had seen it, she knew, and she bit her lip, hating herself. “I didn’t think so,” the woman said, her lips curling. “You’re Arya Stark.”

The moment stretched like a taut bowstring between them. The woman looked at her face while Arya tried to decide what she wanted to do. Finally she thrust the bow and quiver back into the woman’s hands.

“Here,” she said, “it’s too big for me.” She took a step back. “Come, Nymeria,” she said, suddenly wanting an ocean of distance from the woman.

“Did you name her?” the woman asked before Arya could get away. She turned back reluctantly and nodded. The woman smiled. “It fits her,” she said. “Nymeria was queen and warrior and death. She wasn’t afraid to fight for her people. She saved them when the dragons came.”

“Yes, I know,” Arya said, surprised.

“What are you going to do?” she asked again, intently.

“Just tell Stannis what I told you,” Arya said. “You won’t need to draw them out; they’ll come to you.” She took another step back. “I’ll be there,” she said, “I want to watch.”

Dusk fell like a scratchy wool blanket pulled up to the ears. The crofter’s tower stood, wary and mournful in the darkening night sky. Men lined up outside, waiting. Arya stood in the western woods. The wolves teemed restlessly through the trees around her. Something was finally going to happen, they knew, something exciting. One whined anxiously, and Nymeria snapped at her to be quiet.

No matter how tired and starved, two thousand men trudging through a snowy forest make a considerable amount of noise. She heard them coming even before she saw yellow dots bobbing up and down. It was a low noise, a humming almost, that ran through the air down into the ground and traveled up Arya’s spine like a shiver. _Buzzing_ , she thought, _like a hive of bees_.

She heard the shouts ring out when the tower was sighted. The men stopped for a moment, the air crackling with tension and excitement. They buzzed about themselves briefly, then turned back to their new destination and marched forward through the trees and into the long open field stretching south of the tower. They spilled out of the woods quickly, gratefully, a newfound liveliness under their dragging heels, and Arya crept with the wolves to assume their vacated position.

Men were shouting at the front of the group, but Arya couldn’t make out the words. Attempting negotiations, she thought ironically. She wondered if Stannis was outside the tower, if he stood tall and ramrod straight at the forefront of his measly forces in this staunch defense of their run-down fortress. Men turned and grumbled to each other at the rear of the group. Their backs were barely ten yards from her. She shifted and swept her gaze over the line of wolves waiting at the crest of the woods encircling the field on three sides.

She felt more than heard the first warning crack as two thousand Freys shifted their feet on top of the frozen lake dotted with more holes than a moldy, moth-eaten fleece. Arya’s head snapped back to gaze, riveted, upon the scene unfolding, a smile curling up from her very toes.

It started in the center of the group, a little to Arya’s left. She could see a commotion roiling, trapped, from the middle of the lake, and the dread rolled out from that point like ripples breaking from a stone thrown in a pond. The buzzing grew to droning to wailing to yelling to screaming. The men pushed at each other frantically, their feet slipping and sliding, the splintering of melting ice cracking like thunder in Arya’s ears. The black hole spread its inky fingers from the middle of the clearing, dragging men down as they scrambled to escape.

One man clawed his fingers around his brother’s neck, trying to get ahead of him. A boy grabbed an old man’s wrist and dragged him down to the ice as he scrabbled to reach the shore. The lake continued to splinter, and men continued to disappear as the snow gave way beneath their feet.

Arya had never seen anything like it.

When the Freys at the back of the crowd turned, their feet slipping as they made for the shoreline, Nymeria leapt forward, snarling. The other wolves charged, howling, delighted in their bloodthirst to keep the man herd from deserting into the woods.

Arya saw that none got away.


	17. Sansa VIII

Sansa edged her way around broken slabs of ice as big as her horse. The forest stretched two hundred yards away from where she stood at the northern shore. Mist rose innocently in the early-morning glow and twined about cold gray hemlocks. A run-down tower watched her back suspiciously.

 _Bodies float when they are dead_ , Sansa noted with faint surprise. She wondered why she had not known this before. Surely Septa Mordane should have mentioned it at some point? During some lesson between lining her stitches and memorizing the sigils of her father’s bannermen.

The lake was black and bloated with corpses. Their arms stretched oddly; dragging down their neighbors, clawing about their necks. A thousand of them, or thousands, she wasn’t sure how many. They filled the lake from shore to shore, crowded together, some on top of others’ backs, some with only their feet bobbing above the surface. Their gray skin leached into oily pools drifting on the water’s surface. The blue towers embossed on their sigils had faded, waterlogged, into the dark grays of their tunics, their tunics sticking frozen against their gray faces.

A wet gurgling drew her eyes down. It was like water in an overflowing basin being sucked down an overloaded tube. She stepped ten paces along the icy shoreline and crouched.

A young man groped the snowy ground at the lake’s edge. At least, Sansa supposed he was young, but looking now at his saggy, graying skin, she couldn’t be certain. His blind eyes were open. His hard black fingers scraped uselessly like rocks as he tried to cling to the surface. His mouth opened wetly to draw another gasping breath. Three corpses drifted against his back. He slipped, scrabbled unconsciously up the shore, and slipped again.

“Mother, help me,” she whispered. She wished she could run.

“As good as dead,” a voice like gritty chalk said above her. “That one will soon go the same as the rest.”

Sansa stood and looked him in the eye. He did not blink.

“It is merciful to end a dying creature’s suffering,” she said.

“Mercy is a ruse for the weak-willed,” said he. “There is only justice, and injustice.”

He stood ramrod straight. His ragged black cloak hung with the dignity of a king’s robe about his shoulders. The jagged bronze tips of his crown reached up to the heavens like dry weeds thirsty for rain.

“How many men have you here?” she asked, as studiously ignoring his name as he ignored hers. He bristled at the question, but looked around, musing.

“We are near three thousand of us still alive,” he answered. She nodded, her eyes traveling over the men arrayed outside the weary tower, trading wary glances with her own soldiers.

“We followed the Freys’ tracks when they fled,” she told him. “It was my hope to find both of you.”

“And here we are,” he said, without the barest hint of a smile.

The frozen man gasped again, his survival instinct disturbing their exchange.

“Yes,” Sansa said, distracted. “I have left the better part of my army behind with my brother Rickon at Winterfell. Will you join us there? I have much to ask you.”

He looked at her, but Sansa was not sure he even registered her standing there, so little did his face betray his thoughts. A breeze ruffled dark red strands of hair about her face, and his eyes flicked to them before he turned away, his jaw locked painfully.

“These are _your_ soldiers, Lady Sansa?” he asked, looking over where they spilled from the wooded road. Three thousand had departed Winterfell to hunt Freys two days prior, bolstered by the smell of burning corpses. They were horsed, armed and provisioned. They looked now upon the corpses teeming the lake in disappointment.

His eyes narrowed when he saw his Onion Knight. Ser Davos sat awkwardly on his horse at the front of the line. He nodded solemnly, his fingers groping nervously at his chest, the horse’s reins tangling about his wrist. Stannis turned back. Thin eyebrows arched at her in question.

“They followed me to White Harbor, and to Winterfell, now to you,” she answered. “We mean to rebuild Winterfell as an outpost for the North.”

“That is far-sighted of you,” he said, expressionless.

“Indeed,” she said, tamping down her annoyance. “Certainly, it could have been useful to you these past few months.”

He ground his teeth. “It heartens me to hear your brother Rickon lives,” he returned. “As I told the bastard Jon Snow when he argued your claim, there should always be a Stark at Winterfell.”

Sansa held his gaze defiantly. The young Frey scraped his black hands against the shore and coughed wretchedly. The sound crawled up Sansa’s spine and left her tense as a coiled spring.

“By the old gods and the new, will someone put this creature out of its misery?” she demanded, her voice breaking like a whip through the courtyard.

More than a few men stepped forward eagerly, but Stannis lifted his bony hand.

“The Freys have caused great pain,” he said, raising his voice, “and now they will endure great pain. It is justice, Lady Sansa, for your brother and his men.”

 _What do you know about it?_ she wanted to snap. _You weren’t there._

“On Dragonstone you may do what you will,” she said instead. “But we’re in the North now, and I will decide what is justice for my brother.”

He managed to sneer without twitching a muscle. “You dishonor them, my Lady Lannister,” he said.

His words blew with the wind to the far corners of the open field, and jangled against her ever-present fears.

 _Winterfell held by a Lannister_. The utmost disgrace.

She thought of Cersei standing by while Ilyn Payne raised his sword, a bright red flush high on her cheeks. She thought of Tywin sealing a letter to Walder Frey with hot wax and a gold ring. She thought of Tyrion crouching over her in bed.

She was going to scream.

A gray flash in the gray sky, and the frozen man gagged, an arrow feathered at his throat. It wavered obscenely as he flopped and splashed. Another flash, and he sank. Dark red clouds stained the water. A smattering of bubbles popped the surface as the water wavered and stilled.

Sansa and Stannis turned to stare as one. A dark-haired woman stood before the tower, still clutching her bow. She glanced about the now-quiet courtyard, and lowered her weapon uncomfortably.

“He was bothering my brother,” she said in explanation. Sansa nodded woodenly.

“Thank you,” she said. The woman slung the bow over her shoulder and stalked inside.

“Come, my lord,” Sansa said decisively, turning back to Stannis. “We neither of us have need for more enemies.”

He opened his palm ironically, gesturing her before him up to the tower.

The hall was cold and drafty and crammed from wall to wall with hungry soldiers. He led her through the assembly to the back of the long room, up a few stone steps to a low table. Well-worn maps cluttered the surface like haphazard table settings. He scraped back a heavy chair and gestured for her to sit, so she did, glancing around at the bare walls and dusty floor.

“It is no Winterfell, to be sure,” he said, watching her. He leaned back in his chair, chewing his lower lip. A strange tick for such a sparse man.

Bronze Yohn Royce stood at the foot of the dais. She motioned to him, and he lumbered up to her side. Stannis’ eyebrows met his receding hairline.

“Distribute half our rations among Lord Stannis’ soldiers,” she told him. “We head back to Winterfell tonight.” Lord Royce nodded and turned without a second glance.

Sansa peered down at the maps drawn out upon the table. She recognized most of the drawings: there was the Wolfswood, and there Long Lake, the Grey Hills, Widow’s Watch; but some had bumpy outlines, inlets and grooves she had never seen before. She looked up. “Tell me your plans, my lord,” she said.

He well and truly bristled at that. “It is not your place-” he started.

“These are Northmen you have gathered,” she interrupted. “Mountain men. These are Umbers, Flints, Norreys and Liddles. Winterfell is mine until my brother comes of age. Now, tell me your plans.”

He leaned forward, irritated. “Your brother Lord Snow knew to call me King.”

“Yes, I had heard so much,” Sansa replied. “But there is a Stark at Winterfell again, and the North needs no king.”

“Treason,” he hissed. “Your father backed my claim before he died.”

“My lord,” she said, “I’ve no intention to crown Rickon King or start a war with you. I intend only to see another spring, and bring as much of the North with me as I can.”

Stannis chuffed. His knuckles were white from his grip on the table. “Half your kingdom will be starved corpses like the Freys outside before the summer sun shines again. And when the dead walk south of the Wall, what then? Your Northern Houses will fall, one by one, once their fires burn out.”

Sansa swallowed. The spit stuck dryly in her throat. “We are raising glass gardens at Winterfell, and a handful of other outposts-” But Stannis shook his head.

“It won’t be enough, and you know it,” he said. “What good are empty gardens to empty bellies? What good are frozen hands against dead ones, dead but with the strength of demons?”

Sansa tried to laugh. She succeeded only in clearing her throat. “You sound quite extreme, my lord,” she said.

“I’ve seen what I’ve seen,” he said simply.

They sat in a stalemate.

“What would you have me do, my lord?” Sansa asked quietly.

“Give me your men,” he said immediately, as she knew he would.

“Why?” she asked.

“To go North of the Wall with me to stop the bastards before they can cross,” he answered.

“Why?” she asked again.

“‘Why?’ You prefer life to death, don’t you?”

“No, I mean, why do you take up this monumental task as your own?” she asked, genuinely curious.

He straightened his already rigidly straight spine. “I am the rightful King of Westeros,” he said, sounding for all the world like he’d never known a moment’s fun in his life. “The protection of my kingdom is my responsibility, and history will remember me for it.”

Sansa felt a grudging respect for that answer.

“I see,” she said. “What did you mean before about the Houses falling once their fires burn out?”

Stannis shrugged irritably. “The wights are only truly destroyed when burned,” he said. “And all men who are not burned after dying are a danger to their families.”

“Yes, the dead must be burned, everyone knows that,” she mused. “But as long as the fires burn, the wights won’t attack...”

So she needed to find a never-ending supply of burnable wood for all the Houses throughout the North.

And grain. And fruit, vegetables, glass enough to grow it all in...

“Thank you, my lord,” Sansa said. “You have given me much to think of. I will consider your request, and give you my answer after we return to Winterfell.”

Stannis didn’t appear to much like that response, but then, he didn’t appear to like much of anything. He stood as she rose from the table and made her descent to the main hall. Two figures huddled against the back wall. Her gaze swept over them as she nodded mechanically. She noted that one was a thin, stooped old man, and the other a young woman with dark hair and a long nose.

Sansa stopped.

“Jeyne?” she asked in a voice from her past.

The woman crouched forward on her knees and clutched at Sansa’s skirts. “My lady,” she gasped, and though her features were as familiar to her as her own sister’s, Sansa did not recognize her eyes at all. “Sansa,” Jeyne started again, “I am so glad that you are here. I didn’t know- no one knew what happened to you.” Tears pooled in her earnest gaze, and she slid her fingers up the folds in Sansa’s cloak. “I hoped for your sake that you were dead, but now I will be selfish and tell you how happy I am that you are not.”

Sansa pulled her old friend up by the elbow and embraced her gladly.

“Oh, Jeyne,” she whispered, grasping her shoulders. “I thought you had died, too- how strange that here we find each other again, as women now, and so close to home.” She leaned back and thumbed a tear from Jeyne’s cheek.

“Sansa,” Jeyne’s voice trembled. Her eyes darted nervously about the room. “You are so beautiful, just as we all knew you would be. Will you let me serve you?” she pleaded, clutching at Sansa’s wrist. “I’ll fix your hair and mend your dresses. I’ll be your friend and tell stories that make you laugh, just as we used to.”

Sansa felt a smile well up inside her. “Of course, Jeyne,” she said. “I would like very much to have my old friend by my side again.”

A dry cough gave her pause. Sansa turned. Maester Coleman stood patiently, hands folded nicely in front of his robe.

“It’s time to go, my lady,” he said simply.

Sansa hid her surprise. The maester gave her pointed advice at times, but he was not typically one to tell her what to do. She felt herself bristling, but Maester Colemon looked at her significantly.

She sighed. “Very well,” she turned back to Jeyne. “Come to me at Winterfell,” Sansa instructed her, squeezing her wrists once before letting her go. “I’ll set you up there. And bring your companion, too,” she said, glancing at the old man still seated against the wall. His head snapped up at her words.

Sansa peered down at him kindly. The war had not treated him well. The hair left on his head was white and stringy. His hands were missing fingers and his mouth gaped with broken teeth.

“Have you been to Winterfell, ser?” she asked. “The white forest outside its walls is my favorite place on earth. I had only just returned when I had to leave again to come here, and I long to go back.” The old man stared at her, mouthing wordlessly.

“Now that I have my old friend with me again, I feel hope that my childhood home may return after all,” Sansa continued. “If you could have seen it as it once was - there was nothing like it. The halls were always warm even while it blustered outside. And even the wings that were not so clean or so well furnished, well, they were welcoming. When the courtyards were full of business, and the gates stayed open well past dusk for people from town to come and go as they pleased - you could _feel_ Winterfell, then.” She smiled at the old man. “It is as much a home as it is a fortress, and I look forward to welcoming you there.”

“My lady,” Maester Colemon stepped closer and muttered in her ear. “I’m not sure you recognize this person before you.”

She was startled. “Recognize him?” she asked. “No, I don’t believe I’ve had the pleasure, ser...?” she waited expectantly. The man looked at Jeyne, then back to Sansa, before his eyes darted around the room. He looked like a caged rat, tense, cornered, and a bit pathetic.

“Jeyne?” she asked. “Who is your friend?”

But Jeyne wasn’t looking at her any more. She stared at her hands and shook her head mutely.

“Jeyne?” Sansa pressed, bewildered.

“That’s my brother,” a clear voice said. “Not much to look at, I’ll grant you, but he’s not dead yet.” It was the woman who shot her arrow in the drowning boy’s throat.

“Your _brother_?” Sansa asked incredulously, wondering if she was being put upon. This old man was four decades the woman’s senior, at least. “Surely not.”

“He’s had a bad go of it,” the woman said. “The Bolton bastard flayed a few bits off him, but he’s still there. Well, mostly,” She tilted her head and peered down at him. “Except in his head, I don’t think. He’s a bit off these days.”

Sansa gaped at the woman, before she noticed that the white-haired man was doing the same to her. Their eyes met. Sansa felt a shock down to her core.

“And who are you?” she asked the woman slowly.

“Asha Greyjoy,” the woman responded, raising her chin defiantly. She stood up straight and clutched her fist to her chest. “What is dead may never die.”

“And this is your brother...” Sansa stared down at the man, trying to make the wheels in her brain turn.

“Theon,” Asha Greyjoy nodded. “Well, this is what’s left of him.”

Theon looked at her, and she looked at Theon.

They used to play a game they’d dubbed “The Hunt for Lannister Gold.” It was one of the few games all six of them could play, even Bran.

One of them, usually Robb, would start the game by hiding a special trinket in the weirwood forest (sometimes in the second story rooms, if they had to play inside) while the rest of them waited.

When Robb returned, he would give them a clue (“three clicks past where Nymeria fought a boar, the unlucky beast,” or “check the room where poor Helaena had a bit more lemon juice than her liking”) and they would scurry off in search of hidden treasure.

Whoever found the Lannister Gold would hide it again for the next round. They didn’t keep score.

But sometimes a competitive spirit could turn sour, even in a game with no winners or losers.

Arya had looped their mother’s necklace around a low-hanging branch. Sansa had known which weirwood Arya would choose. It was the tree their mother preferred to sit under. When they were younger- and less likely to fight- she would often bring them with her, and tell stories while she brushed Sansa’s hair and Arya climbed the branches behind them.

A twig snapped behind her. It was Theon. Sansa grinned at him and raced to collect her gold.

An arm caught her under the ribcage. She struggled and clawed at his grip.

“Theon!” she screamed. “Let me go! I found it!”

He laughed and loosened his hold. Sansa rushed to free herself.

But Theon grasped her wrist and yanked it, hard, behind her back. Before she knew it, he had the other hand in his grip, too.

Like a flash of lightning, Sansa felt her outrage turn to fear.

Theon was still laughing, though. “Go on, Sansa,” he goaded her. “Go and get it.”

She struggled, but the effort twinged her shoulders painfully. She stilled.

“Let me go,” she said again, calmer this time. She didn’t want to fight him anymore.

It was the first time she realized that it didn’t matter how hard she struggled. She was going to lose.

“Sansa,” this old man who was Theon whispered now. She stared at him and tried to see the boy she remembered. “I didn’t mean to- I’m sorry-” he attempted feebly. He moved his mouth strangely, and Sansa realized his jaw was out of place.

She felt Ser Templeton’s breath on her shoulder. Bronze Yohn Royce stepped into the corner of her sight.

“What- How-” Sansa tried to settle on a question. “Why are you here?”

“We ran away,” Jeyne piped up unexpectedly. “From Winterfell. Theon helped me.”

Sansa stared. Her words didn’t make sense. “You’ve been at Winterfell?”

“Ramsay kept us there,” Jeyne said. “We couldn’t leave. Except- Theon came and got me when they were distracted. We went over the walls and ran.”

He popped up on his knees suddenly and grasped her wrist. “Sansa,” he gasped painfully. “I didn’t- they’re not dead- I mean, it wasn’t them-”

She tried to shake him off, but even in his broken-down state, he was stronger than she. She wasn’t afraid this time, though.

“Let me _go_ , Theon,” she demanded, yanking her arm back violently. Ser Templeton stepped forward immediately and pulled him into a standing headlock.

“How _dare_ you grab hold of me,” she snarled. “After everything you’ve done to our family, how _dare_ you-” Her breath was uneven.

Theon just looked back at her. Ser Templeton’s gauntlets dug in his throat. He couldn’t speak even if he had anything to say.

 _Cowards go in the lake_ , she thought, and turned to Bronze Yohn.

“You don’t want to do that,” Asha Greyjoy said. She raised her empty hands in reassurance to Ser Templeton and stepped up to Sansa’s side. She whispered something in her ear. Sansa felt the words brush against her cheek.

The woman stepped back, hands still raised.

“You’re lying,” Sansa said, because she couldn’t think of anything else to say.

Asha set her hands on her hips. “Some have called me a cunt before, and I’ve had to agree,” she said, “but I won’t be called a liar.”

Sansa looked about her helplessly. _Who am I even looking for?_ she wondered at herself.

“Prove yourself,” she demanded.

Asha smirked. “That’s not really possible right now,” she said. “And I don’t think you’d want to risk it. But I imagine something can be arranged once we’re _all_ safely back at Winterfell,” she said, tilting her gaze to Theon significantly.

Sansa stood for another moment before she turned on her heel and stomped away.

\---

The encounter continued to nettle her following their return to Winterfell.

“I heard the strangest report from your travels, Lady Sansa,” Lady Barbrey announced without so much as a ‘hello’ as she swept into her sitting room. Lord Wyman perked up a bit at her entry. “They say you invited Theon Greyjoy to Winterfell as your friend, but I cannot believe that even you would be so naive for that to be true.”

“Certainly not,” Sansa snapped. “That is to say, I did not recognize him to be Theon when it happened.”

Lady Barbrey stared at her for a moment before bursting into laughter.

“So it is true!” she exclaimed. “How wonderfully ironic!” she wiped a tear from her eye.

Sansa glared at her irritably. “He is _not_ a guest here,” she clarified.

“Did you lock him in the dungeons?” Lord Wyman asked eagerly.

“He is under guard,” Sansa answered vaguely.

“ _Not_ in the dungeons?” Barbrey badgered her. When Sansa didn’t respond, she pressed further. “He is under guard... in a bedroom? Like a guest?”

Sansa was so confused and frustrated, she stamped her foot. “What was I supposed to do?” she demanded. “He’s been flayed and tortured within an inch of his life. He looks like an old man. His days are clearly numbered already. And apparently he had been a friend to _my_ friend when she badly needed one.”

“Who’s that now?” Wyman asked, clearly lost.

“Jeyne Poole,” Sansa answered, once again feeling the thrill of reconnecting with one of her oldest friends. She couldn’t believe how, in even the darkest of times, a little light could break through-

“Ah, yes,” Wyman sighed. “The imposter.” He shook his head. “It’s too bad for that girl. If only she could have withstood them for a little longer.”

Sansa looked at him blankly.

“She helped perpetrate that sham wedding between Ramsay Snow and Arya Stark as your sister’s stand-in,” he explained.

When she had no response to that, he continued.

“The rumor of the union became so widespread seeing as she went through with the wedding and lived as his wife for several months.” He shook his head. “Poor girl,” he said unconvincingly. “I’m sure the man was a brutal husband, but she did greatly demoralize Northern hopes for the Starks’ return with her actions.”

Sansa’s heart beat painfully. “They have been prisoners here for months,” she said to herself. “And I brought them back.”

“Different jailer, same crime,” Wyman agreed all too cheerfully.

“Not Jeyne, though,” she argued, glancing back at Barbrey. “Jeyne is my oldest friend, and I promised her a position as my handmaiden.”

“I don’t see how that will be possible-” Wyman began, but Sansa cut him off.

“I can’t believe she _wanted_ to pretend to be Arya,” she said. “I can’t believe she willingly married that man. She must have been forced.”

“Be that as it may-” Lord Manderly attempted again.

“I too was forced into a marriage I did not choose,” she said forcefully. “Am I beyond help because of it?”

“Your circumstances are different-” he started.

“But _how_?” Sansa exclaimed. “How am I any different?”

“Because you are beautiful, and a Stark, and a _maiden_ ,” Lord Manderly exploded. “That girl is plain, a nobody, and most definitely not a maiden, though she may have been at the time of her wedding.” He looked faintly ashamed, or perhaps disdainful, of speaking to her on this subject. “There is no question that her husband took his liberties with her, or that her husband is a lunatic beast and our _enemy_ , or that she took part in fraudulent marriage under an assumed name, so is not in truth married according to the laws of our country.” Lord Manderly shook his head. “The men won’t want to see you associating with her, my lady, and believe me, you won’t want them associating her with you, either.”

“That is-” Sansa stopped, unsure how to properly describe the soul-razing void his words had created.

“Disgusting,” Lady Barbrey nodded. “Morally contemptible, utterly wretched, and terribly unfair.” She folded her arms. “But it is the truth.”

Sansa shook her head. “There must be some way-”

“What does Lord Stannis want?” Wyman interrupted her.

She sighed. “He wants men to accompany him North of the Wall.”

“Oh, gods,” Barbrey said, “Just what we need, another lunatic on the throne.”

“He’s not a lunatic,” Sansa protested. “You told me yourself you’d seen a dead man walk again- and soon they’ll be crossing the Wall in hordes!”

“Exactly!” she said. “He’s a lunatic if he thinks he can fight the unnatural through natural means. And he wants our men to go and die by his side!” she snorted. “Too bad for him he pissed off his Red Witch. He’d have better luck North of the Wall with her by his side.”

“But she stayed behind with Jon,” Sansa mused. The thought cheered her, strangely.

“The men cannot go to Stannis,” Lord Manderly announced. “We’ve only just rallied them to hope the North will return to strength. To remind them now of your ties to King’s Landing, and for a fool’s errand-”

“We need to build the glass gardens and reopen trade-” Barbrey said.

“Quite so,” Lord Manderly nodded in rare agreement with her. “All Great Houses should be properly prepared-”

“Grain, seeds, livestock, men to guard the roads-”

“Glass, of course, and horses, and river-runners for quick transport-”

“Wood enough to feed the fires-”

“Stop!” Sansa cried. “Enough!” They looked at her in surprise.

She shook her head. “It’s not possible to set up every Great House,” she said. “We should focus on rebuilding Winterfell.”

“Winterfell cannot serve Widow’s Watch, or the Long Lake,” Lady Dustin argued. “It could barely serve Barrowton, and only if the roads are open!”

“Be reasonable,” Sansa pleaded. “Every Great House!” she chuffed. “Perhaps we could visit each House before starvation takes them, if we left today, but where do you suppose the supplies will come from? We have only enough for Ashwood, Winterfell, Moat Cailin and Barrowton, as you know very well!”

“If you leave the greater part of the North without aid, the dead will grow. The faster the Northern Houses fall, the quicker Winterfell will be at risk.”

Sansa couldn’t believe it. She wasn’t arguing the _ethics_ of the plan, she was talking about _facts_! “It doesn’t matter!” she exclaimed. “We don’t have the supplies, and that’s the end of it! We will fortify Winterfell in preparation for an attack and focus our efforts on keeping the people _here_ alive!”

“Hole up and save your own skin?” Lady Dustin said with a haughty sneer. “Spoken like a true Lannister.”

Sansa turned to stone.

“Get out of my sight,” she snarled.

They left.

Sansa paced.

 _Every Great House!_ What did they expect from her? Even the Red Witch conjured fire, not supplies. Not food, or armor, or horses!

Godsdamnit! There was only one House in the whole Seven Kingdoms who could still claim that kind of wealth-

She paused at the window. Robert and Rickon had taken the dogs outside. Robert laid his palm up flat. Good Lord Robert sat. He tilted his hand down. The dog lay on the ground. Robert twisted his palm over quickly, and Good Lord Robert rolled over.

Sansa smiled. He was showing off, she knew, but it looked like he was trying to teach his cousin to do the same.

Rickon stepped up to Shaggydog imperiously. He held out his palm as Robert had done. The direwolf looked back at him, unimpressed.

Robert pulled something out of his pocket, but before he could hand it to Rickon, Shaggydog had snatched it out of his hand.

“Shaggydog, no!” she heard Rickon scold. The direwolf scoffed up his stolen treat and stared at him with baleful eyes.

Sansa chuckled. She wished them both good luck.

The light had just flecked over the treetops. It would be time to go down to the weirwood forest soon.

A knock interrupted her musings.

“Jeyne,” she welcomed her old friend warmly. She stepped for an embrace, but something in the set of her friend’s shoulders stopped her.

“Come in,” she settled for guiding her by the arm to a chair by the window.

“How are you, Jeyne?” she asked kindly. “Is your room warm? Have you been able to wash?”

“Oh, yes,” Jeyne responded a bit airily. “It’s just like old times. Except no parents to tell us to mind our lessons or when to go to bed!” Her laugh was like a rubber band breaking.

Sansa dredged a painful smile from some empty place.

“I just wondered if there was anything you wanted me to do, my lady,” Jeyne said politely. “I’m so keen to be near you again and to help you.”

Sansa sighed. “I’m not sure that will be possible anymore,” she said regretfully.

Sansa saw her friend’s shoulders tighten. The lines of her narrow face grew long and hard.

“But you said I could be your maidservant,” Jeyne protested. “You said that we would be friends again.”

Sansa shook her head. “They told me what you’ve done, Jeyne,” she said. “I’m sorry for it, and for you,” she grimaced. “I can’t imagine what you went through with that monster-”

“It would have been you,” Jeyne muttered. Sansa paused.

“I’m sorry?” she asked.

“If it weren’t for me, they would have done it to you,” Jeyne said, her eyes like poisoned darts. “They would have married you off to that leprous boil-”

“I was in the Vale and well-hidden-” Sansa started, but Jeyne paid her no heed.

“Then you would have been the one to feel his dirty fingers up your insides, his slimy member clogging up your throat-”

“Jeyne!” Sansa exclaimed, shocked.

“But instead of you, it was me,” Jeyne snarled. “Meanwhile, you’ve kept your precious innocence somehow, and they all worship you for it - their pure little Maiden of the North.” She snorted. “But if they’d had their way, it would have been you getting fucked in every rotten hole in your body, and they would have sneered at you and called you names under their breath whenever you pass, instead of me.”

Sansa took a shuddering breath. “I know it wasn’t your fault-”

“Then why are you punishing me for it?” Jeyne demanded.

“I’m not punishing you, I’m sending you to Barrowton with Lady Barbrey - you can start over there, take a new name if you wish-”

“You’re banishing me with that old widow?” Jeyne cried.

“You’ll like her,” Sansa assured her. “She’s quite smart and funny like you - well, in a different way, but-”

“I don’t want to go with her. I want to be with you!” Jeyne said desperately. “We were so close, once, we were almost sisters - I was more your sister than Arya ever was!”

“But you’re not Arya,” Sansa said. “And you’re not my sister,” she shook her head regretfully. “Lady Barbrey will see that you are well situated in Barrowton, but I can’t have you near me.”

Jeyne cried.

“You’re not my friend,” she said. “And you’re a terrible sister, no matter what you tell yourself.”

She ran from the room.

Sansa went down to the kitchens in search of a jug of wine. She downed a glass and drowned the thought of Jeyne’s tears dripping down the raised scar on her face. It was new, and Sansa hadn’t asked how she’d gotten it.

Just before the sun reached its final quarter of the sky, she left the castle, escorted by Ser Templeton, and entered the weirwood forest.

She stood in wait. Ser Templeton fidgeted by her side.

“Are you warm, my lady?” he asked.

“Oh, nothing I can’t withstand,” she returned with tight smile.

“Please, take my cloak,” he said, moving immediately to unpin it.

“No- I- really, ser,” she tried, but the knight had swept the mantle off his back and reached to settle it around her shoulders-

She stepped away quickly.

“I don’t want it,” she said clearly, then amended, “Thank you.” She turned and left him standing three trees away from her.

Was this going to become a problem? Sansa mused. Certainly, she’d let him get very close in a short amount of time. The knight had a pleasant way of sticking around silently, within close quarters if she needed him, but without the urge to inject his own opinion on matters.

She didn’t think he was a braggart, but something about the thought of her men getting the wrong idea about the two of them made her feel... irritated.

Come to think of it, why _didn’t_ he speak his mind from time to time? She couldn’t remember a single meeting from the past two months in which he’d so much as shared a joke, let alone a critique. Didn’t he have any thoughts in his head at all?

She sighed. She needed a sworn protector, and Ser Templeton was a fine choice. She decided she would speak to him, make things clear between them-

“Come on then,” a woman hissed in the shadows.

Asha Greyjoy stepped forward and looked around them suspiciously.

“Just the two of you?” she asked.

Ser Templeton stepped to Sansa’s side and drew his sword. She threw him an approving glance.

“Where are you taking us?” Sansa demanded.

“Not as far as you would think,” Asha said. “But a bit more hidden than this. Doesn’t want uninvited visitors. Not like you,” she flashed a jaunty smile.

They walked to the heart of the forest. When they reached her mother’s favored tree, she stopped.

“Why didn’t she come?” Sansa demanded.

Asha turned and raised her eyebrows.

“Why would she send you?” she pressed further.

Asha snorted. “Why _wouldn’t_ she send me?”

Sansa was confused. She was both ecstatic and terrified. It felt like the last chapter in a terribly long book, and Sansa was afraid to read the ending.

“I don’t believe you,” she said faintly. _I can’t do this_ , she screamed to herself.

She turned to leave. Ser Templeton made to follow, but something caught his eye, and he turned to marble, open-mouthed.

She followed his gaze.

Nymeria had grown even larger than Shaggydog. She was three times the size when Sansa had last seen her, but the molten gold glare remained the same despite the years.

Ser Templeton tensed, waiting for a signal. Nymeria padded up to them.

She nosed Sansa’s palm, surprisingly sweet.

Sansa swallowed.

“Alright,” she whispered. Her fear sprang up as little wet prickles in her eyes.

Nymeria turned and stalked back the way she had come.

Sansa, more nervous than she had been in years, followed.

\-----

Stannis Baratheon’s voice grated in her ears. Sansa knew she should pay attention, but she was more concerned with the goblet of wine in front of her.

“We can’t hole up here like cowards,” Stannis rasped. “The Seven Kingdoms needs us to fight-”

She lifted the wine to her nose. Ah, not too sweet. Dense. Earthy. She breathed it in deeply.

“White Harbor came to bring the Starks back to Winterfell, and now that is accomplished-”

Mmm, it had the smallest bite, but it went down so smoothly...

“And when the Long Night falls? And the wights breach the Wall, what then-”

Sansa sighed, hauled herself out of her seat... and grabbed the pitcher in front of Ser Davos to pour herself another cup.

“The girl and her brother will see to it that any who seek aid will be welcomed here-”

Her teeth were gummy. She ran her tongue around her mouth and tasted the bitter silt left behind.

“Refugees cannot seek aid if they’re dead! Besides, the girl’s _family_ will come seeking her dowry, you can count on that-”

Sansa took another drink. Her shoulders relaxed. The room was warm.

Shouts rose up from the hall outside. The commotion was so great even the jabbering birds inside quieted down, turning their attention to the doors.

“I’ve come to see the Lady!” a voice snarled. “I’ve a present from her brother, and the gods be buggered if some sniveling page is going to stop me!”

Sansa straightened. Her eyes widened.

The door sprang open and crashed against the wall. A man stalked in carrying a plain gray sack. He was half a head taller than Ser Templeton, his shoulders nearly twice as wide. His loose, curly hair couldn’t hide the scars snarling half his face, replacing the corner of his mouth with white puckered skin.

His appearance was, and always had been, the most frightening- the most striking- Sansa had ever seen.

He stopped when he saw her.

Bronze Yohn leapt to his feet and motioned to the Vale soldiers waiting at the ready along the wall.

“You, ser, are no invited guest at Lord Rickon’s court!” he exclaimed. “Take this man and hold him-”

“No,” Sansa said. It was the first she’d spoken since leaving the weirwood forest.

Bronze Yohn gaped at her. Lord Stannis clucked in disbelief. Ser Templeton shifted disapprovingly behind her.

“Let him come,” she demanded.

“But- the Hound-” Bronze Yohn sputtered.

“I know who he is,” she said imperiously, rash with the wine. “He has something for me. Let’s see what it is.”

She beckoned him impatiently when he didn’t step forward. Wine sloshed haphazardly on her wrist.

The Vale men stepped back reluctantly, but the Northmen stood, row by row, as he clomped his way toward her. They stared him down, undaunted and ready.

Sandor Clegane carried on, surefooted as ever.

“My lady,” he greeted her and placed his boot upon the dais. The leather creaked as he hauled himself up to her level. Then he was there, standing before her again, dropped through the years as if he had never left her behind.

He was different, though, from what she remembered. Certainly, he had never much cared for his appearance, but as a member of the Kingsguard, he was given mail and armor, and squires to ensure they gleamed. Now, he wore leather in place of metal, his black attire hiding blood stains much better than a white cloak ever did.

His face was different, too. He looked both older and younger than he had in King’s Landing. She gaped at him, trying to pinpoint what it was. Clegane glanced down at her curiously, his remaining eyebrow arched.

It was a look she well remembered.

Warm, Sansa was warm. How many cups of wine had she had tonight? The room was fuzzy, the corners starting to sway. Her head was heavy.

She unstuck her tongue from the roof of her mouth and cleared her throat. “Have you something for me from my brother Jon?” she asked bravely, a small tremor cracking through.

“Aye, my Lady,” he answered unblinkingly. He held up his bag and turned it over the table.

A severed head crashed down on her plate. It bounced painfully hard before wobbling on the edge of the table above her lap.

Sansa jumped to her feet. The wine upended down the front of her dress as she clutched her chest in shock.

“Seven hells!” she screamed. The head teetered, ready to roll onto her feet. Its dried up skin was purple, its dead eyes shot through with spidery red veins. She backed up ungracefully, her chair scraping against the floor and tripping her escape.

“What the- gods- bloody- _fuck-_ do you think you’re doing?” she ranted. She wiped her hand unhelpfully down the wet stain on her front. Her astonishment turned to outrage like sour wine. She eyed the severed head with revulsion.

“Who was this creature, and why has my brother sent me his head?” she demanded, finally looking up.

Clegane stared at her unrepentantly. After a beat, he shifted, his lip quirking up in a private, hidden smirk.

“Don’t recognize him, my lady?” he asked, all-too-innocently.

“No, I don’t, Others take you-” Sansa stopped. His shoulders were shaking!

She looked around. Bronze Yohn Royce gazed at her in dismay. A haughty sneer stained Lord Stannis’ lips. The men in the hall hung to every word of their exchange, entertained.

 _Ah, damn_ , she thought.

“Whose head is this, _ser_?” she tried again, more docilely this time. Clegane, thoroughly amused, didn’t rise to the bait.

“Ramsay Bolton, the bastard,” he replied. “A gift from your brother, Lord Snow.”

She looked back down, intrigued this time. “Ah yes, I see the teardrops now,” she said, brushing the tattoo with her fingertip, her earlier disgust forgotten.

“Sandor Clegane has brought us the head of our enemy!” she exclaimed. “Ramsay Snow fled battle with us like a coward, only to land in my brother’s camp!” she laughed at the irony and grasped his greasy hair, dangling his head high for all to see.

The men cheered and hollered.

“Thrice damned bastard got what he deserved!” one shouted.

“Others take him straight to hell,” another called, repeating her own earlier curse.

“Should have brought us his corpse, too, so it could be properly buggered-”

Sansa grimaced.

“Here,” she thrust the head to Clegane in disdain. “Take this.”

He did as she asked, dropping it back in the gray sack and slinging it merrily over his shoulder.

“Well done, Hound,” Stannis rasped woodenly, quieting the impudent revelry in the hall. “You may take our thanks and well wishes back to Jon Snow.”

Clegane glanced at him, then back to Sansa.

“I don’t come as an envoy,” he grunted.

“No? Well, then what have you come for?” Stannis asked, stealing the words from Sansa’s tongue.

“Gods if I know,” she heard him mutter.

“This man has traveled far to bring us great news,” Sansa announced, finally setting her empty cup on the table. “I think we can welcome him amongst us before pestering him about his plans for a few days at least.”

The soldiers had lost the thread of the conversation, and a low buzz rose up as they returned to their conversations. The high table, on the other hand, did not look pleased with her decree.

“My Lady, the Hound is wanted throughout Westeros for horrific crimes-” Bronze Yohn rushed to inform her.

Ser Templeton stepped up and murmured in her ear, “I would not have him placed in the same wing as yours, my lady,” he said, placing his hand upon her shoulder, and she did _not_ appreciate that, not one bit. She shook him off a bit more violently than she’d intended and stepped purposely out of his reach. She swayed on her feet and grabbed the back of Lord Manderly’s chair to steady herself.

Gods, how many cups of wine had she had tonight? She tried to count them, then stopped when she realized she couldn’t remember. _Too many_ , she thought.

Lady Dustin leaned back indifferently, and said “I thought that anyone with half a brain could deduce that the Hound of Saltpans was an imposter.”

Sansa glanced at her gratefully.

“That was never confirmed,” Lord Royce argued. “Mayhaps the man before us can prove his innocence-”

Clegane snorted. “Mayhaps you can-”

“That won’t be necessary,” Sansa hurried to interrupt. “I know this man, I will vouch for him.”

Lord Manderly twisted heavily in his seat to fix her with a supercilious look. “But what do you plan to _do_ with him, my lady?” he asked.

Sansa’s head started to pound.

“What do I plan to do with him?” she repeated, thoroughly vexed. “What do I plan to do with one of the strongest men, one of the most skilled warriors in the Seven Kingdoms?” She snorted contemptuously.  “Well, I suppose the kitchens always need extra hands. Or perhaps he can look after the dogs, I know he’s fond of them. Maybe he could even train some of our young conscripts, who are sorely in need of proper guidance.” She glanced at Ser Templeton, then turned to Sandor Clegane with a measured gaze. She thought he stood a little straighter under her scrutiny. “But I think,” she announced, “I would rather have him as my own sworn shield.”

Bronze Yohn made his displeasure known in the set of his scowl. Sansa felt more than saw Ser Templeton’s dejection behind her. Barbrey Dustin simply took another sip of wine.

Sandor looked at her. She’d never been to the Wall, herself, but she imagined the wonder as one stood at the base and looked up, up at its unending heights, sprawling from side to side farther than the eye could see, a greater ascension to the heavens than anything one individual could hope to effect in their lifetime, was something similar to the the glance they shared between them now.

“That is,” she warbled, “if he has no objections.”

“No, I don’t, little bird,” he said.

“There we have it,” Stannis declared, as grandiosely as a man of his stiff propriety could allow. He even gestured woodenly, his arm lifting like a puppet with strings. They turned, surprised to remember he was there. “The Lannister dog has returned to serve at his mistress’ feet,” he stepped around the table impressively.

Everyone stopped at his announcement. Sansa ground her teeth.

“What more proof do you need that Sansa Stark Lannister has mixed allegiances?” he demanded. “She has taken Winterfell for her young brother, she says.” He paced magisterially. “And she has done well by Winterfell, and the North, I grant you.” He fixed them with a portentous look.

“But what will she do when Tyrion Lannister comes North with his armies to take his portion, that which is rightfully his by the laws of our country?”

Her soldiers didn’t like to hear her husband’s name. Sansa had been sure never to speak of him in their presence. She didn’t think she’d said his name since she left the Vale.

“It may not be soon,” Stannis continued, raising his voice over the angry mutters. “Maybe not until summer comes again. But you can always count on a Lannister to come for what is his.”

He turned and pinned her with an ice blue gaze.

“And now she welcomes the Hound as her intimate protector?” He snorted. “Hasn’t the North been under the Lannister heel for long enough?”

“You’re right,” Sansa said.

She wasn’t angry, for once, to hear her married family spoken of.

Sandor Clegane was who he was, and so was she, and they had both been permanently tarred by the Lannister brush.

But she’d be fucked if they were going to allow anyone to hold that against them as a weakness of their characters any longer.

“You’re right,” she said again, finally lurching over the knife’s edge of the decision she had been teetering on for weeks.

“Why _should_ my people live in fear of the day my Lannister husband comes North to take _my_ lands, my people’s hard-fought wealth from me?” She smiled, blessedly free of doubt, for once.

“Shouldn’t, rather, my Lannister husband live in fear of the day his Stark wife goes South to take his?”

Like a torch sparking in the darkness, she met Sandor Clegane’s eyes.

“We’re going to Casterly Rock,” she announced and pointed at him. “And you’re going to take us there.”


End file.
